LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

Class 


HARVARD  COLLEGE  BY  AN 
OXONIAN 


HARVARD  COLLEGE    BY 
AN    OXONIAN 


BY 


GEORGE   BIRKBECK  HILL,  D.C.L. 

HONORARY  FELLOW  OF  PEMBROKE  COLLEGE,  OXFORD 


"  There  is  a  world  elsewhere  " 


N*fo 

THE   MACMILLAN    COMPANY 

LONDON :   MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LTD. 
1906 

All  rights  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  1894, 
BY  MACMILLAN  AND  CO. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped  November,  1894.     Reprinted 
December,  1894 ;  August,  1906. 


Xortoooti 

J.  S.  Gushing  &  Co.  — Berwick  &  Smith. 
Boston,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


TO 

Justin  TOm00r, 

LIBRARIAN  OF  HARVARD  COLLEGE 
AS  A  SLIGHT  TOKEN 

OF 
MY  RESPECT  FOR   HIS   LEARNING 

AND  OF 
MY  GRATITUDE  FOR  HIS  KINDNESS 

TO  MY  WIFE  AND  MYSELF 

DURING  OUR   RESIDENCE  IN  CAMBRIDGE 

MASSACHUSETTS 

Book  is  3iftitcate& 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

PAGE 

The  Growth  of  Harvard. — The  Infant  College. — Early  Gifts  and 
Bequests.  —  "A  Constellation  of  Benefactors."  —  Grants  of  Public 
Money.  —  The  Revolutionary  War.  —  Modern  Benefactors.  — 
Founders  of  Families  and  Founders  of  University  I 

CHAPTER  II. 

The  Foundation  of  Harvard.  —  Cambridge  in  England  and  Cambridge 
in  New  England.  —  "  Fair  Harvard."  —  Emmanuel  College.  —The 
Washington  Elm.  —  General  Washington  a  Doctor  of  Laws. — 
The  University  at  Concord.  —  An  Overbearing  Treasurer.  —  Har- 
vard and  Slavery 23 

CHAPTER  III. 

Religious  Liberty.  — The  Divinity  School.— The  College  Chapel.— 
The  Dudleian  Lectures. — The  English  Liturgy  .  .  .  .42 

CHAPTER  IV. 

Punishments  and  Fines.  —  "The  Ancient  Customs."  —  Fagging  and  • 
"Hazing."  —  Tutors  and  Undergraduates.  —  Rebellions       .         .     55 

CHAPTER  V. 

Odd  Characters.  —  Changes  of  Names  of  Places.  —  Commencement 
Day.  —  Lafayette.  —  Russian  Naval  Officers. — Oxford  Commem- 
oration. —  The  Association  of  the  Alumni.  — The  Classes. — The 
After-dinner  Speeches  . 77 


viii  CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

PACK 

Phi  Beta  Day.  —  Foundation  of  the  Society.  —  Emerson's  Oration  in 
1837. — Charles  Sumner.  —  The  Meeting  and  the  Dinner      .        .   107 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Class  Day.  —  Its  Origin  and  Growth.  —  Orators,  Poets,  and  Odists.  — 
The  New  England  Summer.  —  The  "  Spreads."  —  The  Exercises 
at  the  Tree  .  .120 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

The  Undergraduates.  —  Harvardians  and  Oxonians  contrasted.  —  The 
Athletic  Craze.  —  A  Baseball  Match.  —  Games  regulated  by  the 
Governing  Body  of  the  University.  —  President  Eliot's  Report  .  134 


CHAPTER  IX. 

Caps  and  Gowns.  —  Harvard  College  and  University.  —  The  Dormi- 
tories. —  Room  Rents.  —  Students'  Life  Seventy  Years  Ago.  — 
Memorial  Hall 


CHAPTER  X. 

A  Visit  to  Three  Dormitories.  —  Dining  Clubs.  —  The  Liquor  Law.  — 
Baths.  —  Signs  and  "  Shingles. "  —  Clubs.  —  Politics.  —  Christmas. 
—  A  Student's  Library 171 


CHAPTER  XI. 

Harvard  "  Boys."  —  "  Harvard  Indifference. "  — Harvard  and  Yale. 
—  Honest  Poverty.  —  Oxford  Servitors.  —  Poor  Students.  — 
"  Money  Aids  " 186 


CONTENTS.  ix 

CHAPTER  XII. 

PAGE 

From  a  College  to  a  University.  —  George  Ticknor.  —  Influence  of 
Germany.  —  Oxford  Colleges  Forty  Years  Ago.  —  Provincialism.  — 
Foundation  of  New  Schools  at  Harvard.  —  Duties  of  Professors  .  209 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

The  Elective  System.  —  American  Schools. — The  Study  of  Greek  at 
Oxford  and  Cambridge.  —  Examinations  and  Prizes.  —  The  Grad- 
uate School 227 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

The  Law  School.  —  Nathan  Dane.  —  Joseph  Story.  —  Professor 
Langdell. — The  Law  Library. — The  Law  Review  .  .  .253 

CHAPTER  XV. 

The  Lawrence  Scientific  School.  —  Special  Students  .        .        .        .266 

CHAPTER  XVI. 
Radcliffe  College.— The  Harvard  Annex 273 

CHAPTER  XVII. 

The  Library.  —  Gifts  from  England.  —  The  Fire  of  1764. — Gore 
Hall.  —  The  Bequests  of  Prescott,  Sumner,  and  Carlyle.  —  J.  L. 
Sibley.  —  Dr.  Justin  Winsor 285 

CHAPTER  XVIII. 

The  Government  of  Harvard. —The  Charter. —The  Overseers.— 
The  Corporation,  Church,  and  State.  —  The  Faculty. — The  Pres- 
ident.—  The  Professors.  —  Oxford  and  Harvard  ....  297 


X  CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  XIX. 

PAGE 

Graduate  Schools  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  —  Respublica  Litera- 
torum.  —  American  Students  in  English  Universities.  — The  Old 
Home 317 


ILLUSTRATIONS. 

CHARLES  WILLIAM  ELIOT,  PRESIDENT        ....    Frontispiece 
FIRST  HARVARD  HALL,  BUILT  IN  1682       .        .       Vignette  on  title-page 

HARVARD  COLLEGE  IN  1726 Facing  page      4 

HOLDEN  CHAPEL "        "       12 

HARVARD  COLLEGE.    THE  SECOND  CENTENNIAL  CEL- 
EBRATION, 1836 "        "       26 

THE  WADSWORTH  HOUSE   ......  "        "       86 

THE  YARD "     122 

THE  HEMENWAY  GYMNASIUM "        "150 

MEMORIAL  HALL "        "     169 

THE  COLLEGE  GATE "        "     200 

AUSTIN  HALL "       "     254 

THE  MUSEUM  OF  COMPARATIVE  ZOOLOGY   ...  "        "     266 

THE  LIBRARY,  GORE  HALL "        "     289 

SEVER  HALL «        «     304 


CHAPTER   I. 

The  Growth  of  Harvard. — The  Infant  College. — Early  Gifts  and  Be- 
quests. —  "A  Constellation  of  Benefactors."  —  Grants  of  Public  Money. 
—  The  Revolutionary  War.  —  Modern  Benefactors.  —  Founders  of 
Families  and  Founders  of  University. 

IN  the  summer  and  early  autumn  of  last  year,  I  spent  in  all 
nearly  two  months  in  Cambridge,  Massachusetts,  the  seat 
of  Harvard  College,  the  first  and  the  oldest  of  American 
universities.  A  young  graduate  of  the  College,  with  whom  I 
had  fallen  into  talk  on  my  outward  voyage,  as  we  paced  the 
deck  of  the  Cephalonia,  had  begged  me  not  to  keep  Oxford 
in  my  memory  when  I  visited  the  American  Cambridge. 
Oxford's  ancient  towers,  her  chapels  and  cloisters,  her  halls, 
her  quadrangles  and  her  lawns,  High  Street  and  Broad  Street, 
Magdalen  Bridge,  and  the  massive  ivy-mantled  city  walls,  all 
made  his  heart  sink  within  him  when  he  thought  of  his  own 
beloved  Alma  Mater.  Dear  as  she  was  to  him,  how  could  she 
be  dear  to  one  in  whose  mind  there  always  lived  the  image  of 
the  most  beautiful  and  the  most  venerable  of  all  universities  ? 
" '  Oxford,'  Southey  once  playfully  said,  '  is  a  place  to  make  [ 
an  American  unhappy.'  "  Some  touch  of  this  unhappiness 
seemed  to  have  fallen  upon  my  companion  as  he  then  spoke  to 
me.  There  was  no  need  for  it.  If  Oxford  has  ever  made  a 
single  American  unhappy,  Harvard  on  many  a  summer  day  has 
made  at  all  events  one  Englishman  happy. 

In  a  fog  on  the  Banks  of  Newfoundland  I  had  caught  a 


2  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

heavy  cold,  and  for  nearly  a  fortnight  after  my  arrival  I  kept 
to  the  house.  When  at  length  I  ventured  out,  I  found  the 
"  Yard  "  of  Harvard  as  pleasant  a  place  to  stroll  in  as  the 
garden  of  St.  John's  and  the  walks  of  Magdalen.  One  thing 
only  was  wanting  —  there  was  not  a  single  bench  to  be  found. 
There  was  shade,  and  there  was  beauty,  and  the  hurrying  to 
and  fro  of  young  and  eager  life ;  but  there  was  no  place  for  a 
weary  man  to  sit  and  rest  himself,  as  he  watched  the  flickering 
of  the  light  and  shadow  upon  the  grass,  and  the  student's 
strong  and  rapid  step.  In  my  journal l  I  recorded  :  — 

"  On  a  hot  June  day  I  strolled  with  great  pleasure  in  the 
Yard.  The  lawns  were  beautifully  green,  and  the  tall,  graceful 
trees  cast  everywhere  a  delightful  shade.  It  was  surprising 
how  green  was  the  grass  and  how  fresh,  overshadowed  though 
it  was  by  trees.  There  is  no  quadrangle  in  Oxford  more  de- 
lightful on  a  hot  summer  day.  Harvard  surely  is  a  College^ 
that  a  man  can  love."  The  old  red-brick  halls  which  enclose 
two  sides  of  the  Yard  recalled  to  my  mind  not  so  much  Oxford 
as  the  Courts  of  the  Temple.  Much  of  the  beauty  of  the  scene 
was  due  to  the  freshness  of  the  foliage,  for  the  New  England 
spring  is  late.  I  had  spent  the  winter  in  Switzerland.  When 
I  left  Clarens  on  May  2,  the  lilacs  had  already  faded.  Ten 
days  later  I  found  them  in  full  bloom  in  the  parks  of  Liver- 
pool. On  the  twenty-second,  the  day  on  which  I  landed,  they 
were  still  in  bud  in  Cambridge.  In  June,  therefore,  the  trees 
were  in  their  first  freshness.  In  the  winter,  when  they  were 
stripped  of  their  leaves,  and  when  the  lawns  were  hidden 
beneath  the  snow,  the  Yard  would  not  bear  a  comparison  with 
Oxford.  I  was  fortunate  in  seeing  it  at  its  best;  when  the 

1  In  the  few  extracts  which  I  give  from  my  journal  I  have  not  strictly 
followed  the  text;  sometimes  I  have  thrown  two  entries  into  one. 


i.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  3 

red-brick  halls,  half-revealed  through  the  green  leaves,  half- 
hidden,  with  a  sky  above  them  blue  as  the  skies  of  Italy,  have 
a  beauty  of  their  own. 

One  pleasant  sight  I  unfortunately  missed.  In  the  summer 
evenings  it  has  long  been  the  habit  for  the  Glee  Club  to  sing 
in  the  Yard,  while  the  students  lie  about  on  the  grass,  or  lean 
out  of  the  windows  of  their  rooms  listening.  I  went  there 
once  or  twice  in  the  hope  of  hearing  the  songs,  but  I  chose 
the  wrong  time  or  the  wrong  day.  The  Yard  was  silent.  This 
pleasant  custom,  I  fear,  is  not  so  well  kept  up  as  of  old.  The 
Crimson,  the  undergraduates'  daily  paper,  laments  its  decay. 
So  long  ago  as  Emerson's  young  days,  singing  was  cultivated  in 
the  College.  He  presented  himself  with  some  of  the  other 
freshmen  to  the  singing-master,  who,  "  when  his  turn  came,  said 
to  him,  '  Chord  ! '  '  What?  '  said  Emerson.  '  Chord  !  Chord  ! 
I  tell  you,'  repeated  the  master.  '  I  don't  know  what  you 
mean,'  said  Emerson.  '  Why,  sing  !  Sing  a  note  ! '  So  I  made 
some  kind  of  a  noise,  and  the  singing-master  said,  *  That  will 
do,  sir.  You  need  not  come  again.'  "  l 

The  long  vacation  I  spent  in  a  pleasant  village  on  Cape 
Cod.  When  I  returned  to  Cambridge  at  the  end  of  Septem- 
ber, it  was  almost  with  a  feeling  of  anxiety  that  I  went  back 
to  a  spot  where  I  had  happily  sauntered  away  so  many  an  idle 
hour.  I  feared  lest  I  should  find  that,  under  the  fierce  influ- 
ence of  the  summer  heats,  most  of  its  charms  had  passed 
away.  My  mind  was  soon  set  at  rest.  "The  Yard,"  I  re- 
corded, "looked  very  pretty  and  pleasant  in  the  sunshine 
of  an  autumn  day.  I  wandered  about  it  for  more  than  half 
an  hour  with  enjoyment,  watching  the  bustle  of  the  beginning 
of  term,  and  the  young  life  so  full  of  activity  and  hope. 

1O.  W.  Holmes's  R.  W.  Emerson,  1885,  p.  361. 


4  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

How  many  Presidents  of  the  United  States  —  Presidents,  at 
least,  in  their  confident  ambition  —  were  passing  by  me !  " 

How  vast  was  the  change  since  those  far-distant  days  when 
"the  fair  and  comely  edifice  "  of  freshly-cut  timber  in  which 
the  infant  University  was  lodged,  on  a  narrow  strip  of  land 
"bordering  a  pleasant  river,"  was  "thought  by  some  to  be  too 
gorgeous  for  a  wilderness,  and  yet  too  mean,  in  others'  appre- 
hensions, for  a  college !  "  *  Oxford,  not  many  years  earlier, 
had  seen  rise  amid  the  meadows  outside  her  city  walls,  that 
graceful  pile  in  which  the  Gothic  college  and  the  ancient 
Jacobean  mansion  are  so  happily  blended.  The  fair  monu- 
ment which  Nicholas  Wadham  raised  to  himself  is  durable, 
for  it  is  built  in  stone.  No  less  durable  is  the  monument 
which  John  Harvard  helped  to  raise,  built  though  it  was  with 
unseasoned  wood.  This  home  of  learning  was  destined  to 
prove  an  abiding  city;  for  its  foundations  rested,  not  on  the 
piety  of  any  one  man,  but  on  the  zeal  and  the  affection  of  a 
high-minded  community.  A  man  of  great  nobility  of  charac- 
ter presided  over  the  General  Court  of  the  Colony  which 
passed  the  first  vote  of  money  "towards  a  school  or  college." 
It  was  Henry  Vane  —  Milton's  "Vane,  young  in  years,  but  in 
sage  counsels  old."  He  links  Harvard  to  Oxford,  for  it  was 
in  Magdalen,  most  beautiful  of  colleges,  that  he  had  studied. 
His  statue  might  well  stand  beside  the  Puritan  minister's, 
under  the  shadow  of  the  noble  hall  which  commemorates  the 
brave  men  who,  two  hundred  years  later,  fell  in  the  defence 
of  that  liberty  for  which  Harvard  crossed  the  sea,  and  for 
which  Vane  gave  his  life. 

1  New  England's  First  Fruits  and  Johnson's  Wonder  Working  Provi- 
dence>  1651,  quoted  in  The  Early  College  Buildings  at  Cambridge,  by  A.  M. 
Davis,  1892,  p.  4. 


txo 

Q     •£ 


I.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  5 

However  "  fair  and  comely  "  was  the  outside  of  the  building, 
inside  there  was  poverty  enough.  In  a  country  where  the 
midwinter  cold  ofttimes  is  so  sharp  that  it  freezes  the  inlets 
of  the  sea,  in  few  of  the  chambers  and  studies  was  there  a 
fireplace.  The  modern  American  likes  to  keep  up  the  tem- 
perature of  his  house  to  seventy  degrees.  In  the  lecture- 
rooms  at  Harvard,  the  thermometer  is  not  allowed  to  fall 
below  sixty-eight.  It  often  stands  above  this  oppressive  heat. 
The  forefathers  of  these  delicate  New  Englanders  lived  in  a 
building  made  of  ill-seasoned  wood,  which  would  soon  have 
shrunk  and  let  the  north  wind  sweep  through  the  crevices. 
"The  students  must  have  collected  in  the  hall  within  the 
settle,  where,  by  the  light  of  the  public  candle,  cowering  over 
the  public  fire,  was  to  be  found  the  only  place  where  they 
could,  with  any  sort  of  comfort,  pursue  their  studies  during 
the  long  winter  evenings."1  A  set  of  rules,  under  the  name 
of  Liberties  and  Orders  of  Harvard  College,  had  been  drawn 
up  for  their  government.  No  scholar  was  to  be  admitted  till 
"he  was  able  to  read  Tully,  or  such  like  classical  author 
extempore,  and  make  and  speak  true  Latin  in  verse  and  prose, 
suo  (ut  aiunt}  Marte,  and  decline  perfectly  the  paradigms 
of  nouns  and  verbs  in  the  Greek  tongue." 2  Such  a  knowledge 
of  Latin  seems,  at  first  sight,  little  likely  to  have  been  met 
with  in  so  young  a  settlement;  but  outside  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge, there  was  perhaps,  at  this  time,  no  spot  where  among 
an  equal  number  of  inhabitants,  so  many  Englishmen  were  to 
be  found  who  had  received  a  liberal  education.  So  early  as 
1638  there  were  forty  or  fifty  graduates  of  the  old  country 

1  The  Early  Buildings  at  Cambridge,  p.  23;    The  College  in  Early 
Days,  p.  8. 

2  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  515. 


6  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

dwelling  in  the  sparse  villages  of  New  England.1  These  men 
were  not  those  failures  of  a  university  who,  in  the  present 
age,  year  after  year  cross  the  sea  to  our  Colonies  to  become 
failures  once  more.  They  were  a  chosen  band,  broken  to  toil 
and  hardships,  and  yet  retaining  a  deep  love  of  learning. 
Their  children  should  not  grow  up  in  ignorance.  "'Learn- 
ing,' to  use  their  own  fine  expression,  was  not  'to  be  buried 
in  the  graves  of  the  fathers.'  "  2  In  almost  every  parish  there 
was  a  minister  "who  usually  prepared  the  young  men  for  their 
examinations.  Latin  was  taught  as  a  spoken  language. 
Often  teacher  and  pupil  would  take  walks  together  through 
the  fields  and  woods,  and  converse  of  all  they  saw  in  Latin."8 
The  rules  by  which  the  infant  College  was  governed  are  too 
long  to  quote  at  length.  The  following  will  serve  as  in- 
stances :  — 

"  Every  one  shall  consider  the  main  end  of  his  life  and  studies  to  know 
God  and  Jesus  Christ,  which  is  eternal  life.  * 

"They  shall  honour  as  their  parents  magistrates,  elders,  tutors,  and 
aged  persons  by  being  silent  in  their  presence  (except  they  be  called  on 
to  answer),  not  gainsaying;  showing  all  those  laudable  expressions  of  hon- 
our and  reverence  in  their  presence  that  are  in  use,  as  bowing  before  them, 
standing  uncovered,  or  the  like. 

"  None  shall  pragmatically  intrude  or  intermeddle  in  other  men's  affairs. 

"None  shall,  under  any  pretence  whatsoever,  frequent  the  company 
and  society  of  such  men  as  lead  an  ungirt  and  dissolute  life. 

"  The  scholars  shall  never  use  their  mother  tongue,  except  that  in  public 
exercises  of  oratory,  or  such  like,  they  be  called  to  make  them  in  English. 

"  Every  scholar  shall  be  called  by  his  surname  only  till  he  be  invested 
with  his  first  degree,  except  he  be  a  Fellow- Commoner  or  Knight's  eldest 
son,  or  of  superior  nobility."4 

1  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  II.  256. 

2  Harvard  College,  2^oth  Anniversary,  p.  253. 

8  History  of  Higher  Education  in  Massachusetts,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  24. 
*  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  515. 


I.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  7 

By  this  last  rule  it  is  not  meant  that  the  Christian  name 
shall  not  be  used,  but  that  no  title  of  respect,  such  as  Sir  or 
Master,  shall  be  given.  Johnson,  in  a  note  on  Sir  Oliver 
Mar-text  in  As  You  Like  If,  says :  "  He  that  has  taken  his  first 
degree  at  the  University  is  in  the  Academical  style  called 
Dominus,  and  in  common  language  was  heretofore  termed 
Sir."  1  In  the  Harvard  accounts,  quoted  in  Mr.  A.  M.  Davis's 
Early  College  Buildings?  we  find  entered  Sir  Bulkeley,  Sir 
Brewster,  and  Sir  Downing.  Sir  Downing  was  George  Down- 
ing, the  "stingy  fellow"  and  "perfidious  rogue"  of  Pepys's 
Diary* 

The  lot  of  the  two  first  presidents,  Dunster  and  Chauncy, 
was  as  hard  as  the  lot  of  learned  men  has  so  often  been  in 
all  times  and  in  all  countries.  The  ills  which  assailed  the 
scholar's  life  assailed  them.  They  were  scarcely  happier 
than  Lydiat  or  Galileo.  Both  were  men  of  great  learning. 
Chauncy  had  been  nominated,  by  the  heads  of  Houses  at  the 
English  Cambridge,  to  the  chair  of  Hebrew,  and  had  filled 
the  chair  of  Greek.4  They  did  their  duty  faithfully,  and  had 
as  their  reward,  "  thankless  labour,  unrequited  service,  arrear- 
ages unpaid,  posthumous  applause,  a  doggerel  dirge,  and  a 
Latin  epitaph."6  It  was  the  res  dura  et  regni  novitas  —  the 
hard  times  and  all  the  difficulties  of  a  young  settlement  — 
which  were  mostly  to  blame.  The  first  president  had  added 
to  his  troubles  by  "  falling  into  the  briers  of  Antipsedobap- 
tism.  He  had  borne  public  testimony  in  the  church  at 

1  Johnson's  Shakespeare,  ed.  1765,  II.  66.  2  P.  8. 

8  Ed.  1848,  I.  108,  333. 

4  Perhaps,  however,  he  was  only  Greek  Lecturer  at  Trinity  College. 
See  the  Dictionary  of  National  Biography 
6  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  14. 


8  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Cambridge  against  the  administration  of  baptism  to  any 
infant  whatsoever."  Privations  he  was  more  able  to  put  up 
with  than  heresy.  In  a  petition  to  the  Governor  he  said: 
"Considering  the  poverty  of  the  country,  I  am  willing  to 
descend  to  the  lowest  step;  desiring  nothing  more  than  to 
supply  me  and  mine  with  food  and  raiment."1  The  second 
president  also  had  his  own  briers  of  baptism  into  which  he 
fell.  Contrary  to  the  prevailing  faith  among  the  settlers  that 
"a  sprinkling  was  sufficient,"  he  maintained,  says  an  early 
writer,  "that  the  infant  should  be  washed  all  over, —  an  opin- 
ion not  tolerable  in  this  cold  region,  and  impracticable  at 
certain  seasons  of  the  year."2  He  had  as  hard  a  lot  as  his 
predecessor. 

Nineteen  years  after  the  College  had  been  founded,  it  pos- 
sessed, as  was  stated  in  a  memorial,  "  in  real  revenue  about 
twelve  pounds  per  annum  (which  is  a  small  pittance  to  be 
shared  among  four  Fellows),  besides  fifteen  pounds  per  annunf 
which,  by  the  donors'  appointment,  is  for  scholarships."8 
Nevertheless,  the  sum  of  money  voted  by  the  General  Court 
for  the  foundation  of  the  College,  "was  equal  to  a  year's  rate 
of  the  whole  Colony."4  From  the  first,  gifts  and  benefits  had 
not  been  wanting,  but  it  was  "willing  poverty"  rather  than 
wealth  which  gave.  Of  wealthy  men  there  were  few,  if  any, 
to  be  found.  John  Harvard,  that  "godly  man,"  that  "lover 
of  learning,"  a  graduate  of  Emmanuel  College,  Cambridge, 
and  "sometime  minister  of  God's  word  at  Charlestown, " 
bequeathed  to  the  College  half  his  property  and  his  library. 
The  sum  received  was  not  quite  four  hundred  pounds.  His 
books  give  us  some  insight  into  the  character  of  a  man  of 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  18,  2O.  2  Ib.  I.  47. 

«  Ib.  I.  23.  *  Ib.  I.  8. 


I.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  9 

whom,  unhappily,  scarcely  anything  is  known.  He  had 
brought  with  him  across  the  sea  more  than  two  hundred  and 
sixty  volumes,  among  them  not  only  Chrysostom  and  Calvin, 
Duns  Scotus,  and  Luther,  but  Homer  and  Plutarch,  Terence 
and  Horace,  with  Stephanus's  notes,  Chapman's  Homer, 
Bacon's  Essays  and  Advancement  of  Learning,  and  Camden's 
Remains.  The  magistrates  raised  among  themselves  two 
hundred  pounds  to  be  spent  on  books.  Other  gifts  came  in. 
The  Rev.  W.  Allen  sent  two  cows.  Cotton  cloth  worth  nine 
shillings  was  given  by  Richard  Dana,  the  ancestor  of  another 
Richard  Dana,  who,  nearly  two  hundred  years  later,  when  a 
student  of  Harvard,  failing  in  health,  went  for  two  years 
before  the  mast,  and  on  his  return  gave  the  world  a  delightful 
book.  The  Rev.  Mr.  Latham,  of  Lancaster  County,1  England, 
sent  five  pounds.  Richard  Saltonstall,  a  man  of  large  means, 
gave  more  than  five  hundred  pounds.  He  belonged  to  one  of 
those  New  England  families,  happily  not  few  in  number,  who, 
generation  after  generation,  have  shown  their  love  for  Harvard. 
Theophilus  Gale,  Fellow  of  Magdalen  College,  Oxford,  "a 
learned  and  industrious  divine,  as  appears  by  his  Court  of  the 
Gentiles  and  his  Vanity  of  Pagan  Philosophy"  bequeathed  his 
library  to  the  College.  From  Sir  John  Maynard,  who  outlived 
all  his  brother-lawyers,  and  but  for  the  coming  of  William  of 
Orange  would  have  outlived  the  law  also,  came  eight  chests 
of  books.  From  the  New  England  towns  and  villages,  and  even 
from  distant  settlements,  contributions  flowed  in.  Little  Scar- 
borough, away  to  the  north  in  Maine,  sent  two  pounds  nine 
shillings  and  sixpence,  while  from  the  far-distant  South,  the 

1  I  have  seen  on  a  tombstone  in  the  graveyard  of  Barnstable,  Massa- 
chusetts, a  man  described  as  being  born  "  in  the  County  of  Lancashire, 
England."  The  meaning  of  the  word  shire  is  apparently  lost  in  America. 


10  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

people  of  Eleutheria  in  the  Bahamas,  "out  of  their  poverty," 
sent  one  hundred  and  twenty-four  pounds.  Smaller  gifts  came 
in,  such  as  a  pewter  flagon  worth  ten  shillings,  a  bell,  a  fruit- 
dish,  a  sugar-spoon,  a  silver-tipt  jug,  one  great  salt,  and  one 
small  trencher-salt.1  In  the  Information  of  the  Present  Neces- 
sities of  the  College  which  was  laid  before  the  General  Court 
in  1655,  mention  is  made  of  "some  parcels  of  land,"  owned 
by  the  College,  "  none  of  which  can  with  any  reason  or  to  any 
benefit  be  sold."  A  happy  thing  it  was  that  these  "parcels" 
were  retained,  for  some  of  them  have  risen  enormously  in 
value.  The  house  and  plot  of  ground  in  Boston  which  one 
Henry  Webb  bequeathed  to  the  College  in  1660,  ten  years 
ago,  was  set  down  in  the  accounts  as  worth  one  hundred  and 
sixty-five  thousand  dollars  [^33, 730]. 2  Let  "the  gentle 
reader "  who  buys  his  book  at  Messrs.  Little,  Brown  & 
Co.'s  shop  give  a  thought  to  the  old  Puritan,  who  two  and  a 
half  centuries  ago  lived  on  this  very  spot,  and  dying  left  "  the* 
rent  to  be  forever  for  the  maintenance  of  some  poor  scholars, 
or  otherwise  for  the  best  good  of  the  College." 

With  all  these  gifts,  the  College  long  remained  poor.  How 
small  were  its  means,  even  so  late  as  1695,  is  shown  by  a  vote 
of  the  Corporation  "  that  six  leather  chairs  be  forthwith  pro- 
vided for  the  use  of  the  library,  and  six  more  before  the  com- 
mencement, in  case  the  treasury  will  allow  of  it."8  Forks 
appear  for  the  first  time  in  the  accounts,  in  1707.  So  late 
as  the  middle  of  last  century,  "each  scholar  carried  to  the 
dining-table  his  own  knife  and  fork,  and  when  he  had  dined, 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  10,  12,  166,  506-513. 

2  Ib.  I.  23;  Annual  Reports,  1 883-4,  Appendix,  p.  19;  The  Exhibitions 
at  Harvard  College,  by  A.  M.  Davis,  p.  5. 

8  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  49. 


I.  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  11 

wiped  them  on  the  tablecloth."1  A  short  time  before  Adam 
Smith  became  an  exhibitioner  of  Balliol  College,  the  knives 
and  forks  were  chained  to  the  table.2  In  the  inns  in  France, 
even  many  years  later  than  this,  a  knife  was  not  supplied, 
only  a  fork.  Dr.  Alexander  Carlyle,  in  1742,  noticed,  as  a 
sign  of  increasing  refinement  in  Scotland,  that  at  the  tavern 
in  Haddington,  where  the  Presbytery  dined,  knives  and  forks 
were  provided.8  There  was  so  little  money  in  the  Colony 
that  the  Harvard  students  often  settled  their  accounts  in  kind. 
"  Bills  were  paid  with  rye,  Indian  [corn],  wheat,  malt,  apples, 
butter;  with  cows,  oxen,  sheep,  lambs,  steers;  with  beef,  pork, 
and  bacon;  with  sugar  and  salt;  with  wool  and  sacking.  Pay- 
ments in  meat  would  appear,  at  one  time,  to  have  become  dis- 
proportionately large";  for  in  1667  the  overseers  "ordered 
that  the  Steward  shall  not  be  injoyned  to  accept  of  above 
one  quarter  part  flesh-meat  of  any  person."4 

Better  days  were  drawing  near.  Harvard  had  warm  friends 
on  both  sides-  of  the  Atlantic,  and  on  both  sides  wealth  was 
rapidly  increasing.  From  the  old  home  gifts  and  bequests 
came  to  the  College,  which,  likely  enough,  would  have  gone 
to  Oxford  or  Cambridge  had  either  university  been  opened  to 
the  Nonconformists.  The  miserable  test  of  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles  deprived  our  ancient  seats  of  learning  of  good  men 
and  good  money.  "  Among  the  English  Dissenters,  Harvard 
College  had  at  all  times  been  the  object  of  munificent  patro- 
nage." "The  constant  stream  of  gifts  which  flowed  from  Eng- 
land "  did  not  cease  even  with  the  War  of  the  Revolution.5 

1  Early  College  Buildings,  pp.  13,  20. 

2  Scotland  and  Scotsmen  in  the  Eighteenth  Century,  II.  307. 

8  A.  Carlyle's  Autobiography,  p.  64.  4  Early  College  Buildings,  p.  12. 

6  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  115;  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  52. 


12  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

In  the  names  given  to  Holden  Chapel  and  Holworthy  and 
Hollis  Halls,  are  commemorated  English  benefactors  who 
never  set  foot  on  American  soil.  Sir  Matthew  Holworthy, 
a  London  merchant,  bequeathed  to  the  College  the  largest 
sum  which  it  received  in  the  seventeenth  century.  Of  men 
bearing  the  name  of  Hollis,  there  was  "a  constellation  of 
benefactors,"  to  use  the  words  of  President  Quincy.  So  long 
ago  as  1690,  Robert  Thorner,  the  uncle  of  the  first  of  the  seven 
who  form  this  constellation,  left  property  to  the  College.  The 
last,  who  died  in  1804,  bequeathed  one  hundred  pounds  to 
be  laid  out  in  Greek  and  Latin  classics.  Four  of  these  men 
bore  the  Christian  name  of  Thomas.  The  first  Thomas 
founded  Professorships  of  Divinity  and  of  Mathematics  and 
Natural  Philosophy.  "Scarcely  a  ship  sailed  from  London 
during  the  last  ten  years  of  his  life  without  bearing  some 
evidence  of  his  affection  and  liberality."  On  sending  the 
first  of  his  numerous  presents  of  books  to  the  Library,  he  wroffe : 
"After  forty  years'  diligent  application  to  mercantile  busi- 
ness, my  God,  whom  I  serve,  has  mercifully  succeeded  my 
endeavours,  and  with  my  increase  inclined  my  heart  to  a 
proportional  distribution.  I  have  credited  the  promise,  'He 
that  giveth  to  the  poor  lendeth  to  the  Lord, '  and  have  found 
it  verified  in  this  life."  His  grandson's  donations,  though 
not  nearly  so  large,  scarcely  fell  short  of  two  thousand  pounds 
sterling.1  He  is  Thomas  Hollis,  "the  strenuous  Whig,"  de- 
scribed by  Boswell,  "  who  used  to  send  over  Europe  presents 
of  democratical  books,  with  their  boards  stamped  with  daggers 
and  caps  of  liberty."  Many  of  these  volumes  came  to  Har- 
vard "  splendidly  bound,  and  the  covers  stamped  with  a  char- 
acteristic emblem  or  device.  Some  are  marked  by  a  liberty 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  183,  186,  232,  430;  II.  147,  411. 


I.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  13 

cap,  or  an  owl  holding  in  its  talons  a  pen,  with  the  motto, 
'By  deeds  of  peace  ';  others  by  the  effigy  of  Liberty,  holding 
in  her  right  hand  her  cap,  and  in  her  left  a  spear."  The 
learned  Mrs.  Carter  said  "he  was  a  bad  man.  He  used  to 
talk  uncharitably. "  To  which  Johnson  replied :  "Poh!  poh! 
madam;  who  is  the  worse  for  being  talked  of  uncharitably? 
Besides,  he  was  a  dull,  poor  creature  as  ever  lived;  and  I 
believe  he  would  not  have  done  harm  to  a  man  whom  he  knew 
to  be  of  very  opposite  principles  to  his  own.  I  remember 
once  at  the  Society  of  Arts,  when  an  advertisement  was  to  be 
drawn  up,  he  pointed  me  out  as  the  man  who  could  do  it  best. 
This,  you  will  observe,  was  kindness  to  me.  I,  however, 
slipt  away,  and  escaped  it."  When  Mrs.  Carter  went  on  to 
say:  "I  doubt  he  was  an  Atheist,"  Johnson  rejoined,  "I  don't 
know  that.  He  might,  perhaps,  have  become  one  if  he  had 
had  time  to  ripen  (smiling).  He  might  have  exuberated 
into  an  Atheist." 1  Horace  Walpole  described  him  as  a  "most 
excellent  man,  a  most  immaculate  Whig,  but  as  simple  a  poor 
soul  as  ever  existed,  except  his  editor."  2  Dr.  Franklin  wrote 
much  more  highly  of  him.  Speaking  of  what  he  had  done, 
he  writes:  "It  is  prodigious  the  quantity  of  good  that  may 
be  done  by  one  man,  if  he  will  make  a  business  of  if  3 

Though,  at  its  foundation,  Harvard  received  a  grant  of 
public  money,  nevertheless,  to  the  Commonwealth,  during  the 
two  centuries  and  a  half  of  its  existence,  it  has  owed  but  little. 
It  has  slowly  been  raised  up  to  its  great  height,  first  by  the 
generous  zeal  for  learning  in  outsiders,  and  next  by  the  love 
and  liberality  of  its  own  children.  By  the  State  it  was  far 

1  Boswell,  Life  of  Johnson,  Clarendon  Press  edition,  IV.  97. 

2  Walpole's  Letters,  VII.  346. 

8  Franklin's  Memoirs,  ed.  1818,  III.  135. 


14  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

more  encumbered  by  the  unsoundness  which  afflicted  the  cur- 
rency during  the  whole  of  the  eighteenth  century,  than  relieved 
by  the  aids  which  were  conferred.  Twenty  years  before  the 
vast  disturbance  to  public  credit  that  was  caused  by  the  Revo- 
lutionary War,  so  early  as  1755,  the  treasurer  of  the  Col- 
lege, on  valuing  its  property,  "  put  down  all  the  capital  sums 
at  only  one-fifth  part  of  the  nominal  sums  originally  given, 
in  consequence  of  the  funds  having  sunk  by  the  depreciation 
of  the  paper  currency." l  By  the  end  of  the  war  the  deprecia- 
tion had  become  far  greater.  Fifteen  thousand  six  hundred 
pounds,  not  in  nominal  but  in  real  value,  which  before  the 
outbreak  of  hostilities  had  been  invested  in  the  public  funds, 
if  sold  out  eleven  years  later,  would  have  produced  no  more 
than  seven  hundred  and  fifty-eight  pounds.2  Silver  and  gold 
had  disappeared  from  common  use;  "in  paper  money,  a  quill 
cost  a  dollar  and  a  half,  and  a  dinner  over  fifty  dollars." 8  In 
1780  the  Professor  of  Divinity  was  paid  in  paper  money,  the 
magnificent  sum  of  nine  thousand  one  hundred  and  ninety-two 
pounds,  for  one  year's  salary.  Let  not  our  Regius  Professor 
of  Divinity  at  Oxford  mournfully  reflect  that  in  a  petty  col- 
lege in  a  small  colony,  in  the  comparative  poverty  of  last 
century,  a  rebel's  heterodoxy  received  as  its  reward  nearly 
five  times  as  much  as  his  own  orthodoxy  at  the  present  day  in 
the  wealthiest  university  in  the  world.  In  gold,  silver,  and 
copper,  the  poor  man  would  have  been  paid  only  eighty-seven 
pounds  ten  shillings  and  eight-pence;4  more  than  enough, 
no  doubt,  for  a  Dissenter  and  a  rebel,  but  scarcely  enough  for 
the  needs,  however  modest,  of  human  life.  Part  of  the  heavy 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  237.  2  Ib.  II.  250. 

8  Higher  Education,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  67. 
*  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  538. 


I.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  15 

loss  which  fell  on  Harvard  was  made  up  by  severe  economy, 
and  by  the  management  of  an  honest  and  able  treasurer. 
Through  the  worst  times  the  Corporation,  mainly  trusting 
to  his  advice,  "held  with  unshaken  firmness  the  certificates 
of  public  debt  which  they  had  been  compelled  to  receive, 
and  vested  in  them  with  great  judgment  whatever  sums  were 
brought  into  their  treasury.  On  the  funding  of  the  National 
Debt,  the  College  derived  the  full  benefit  of  their  wisdom 
and  of  their  confidence  in  the  ultimate  returning  of  the 
nation  to  a  sense  of  justice."1 

The  Legislature  of  Massachusetts  twice  wronged  the  com- 
munity at  large  by  granting  a  lottery  to  Harvard.  With  the 
aid  of  the  money  thus  mischievously  raised  two  new  halls  were 
built.2  For  ten  years,  beginning  with  1814,  the  College  re- 
ceived an  annual  contribution  from  the  State  of  ten  thousand 
dollars  (^£2044),  a  large  part  of  which,  by  the  terms  of  the 
vote,  was  spent  in  defraying  the  fees  of  poor  students.8  Since 
1824,  no  public  aid  of  any  kind  has  been  granted.  Happily, 
the  stream  of  private  bounty  soon  began  to  flow  more  liberally 
than  ever.  Even  before  1780,  about  three  times  as  much  had 
come  to  the  College  by  gifts  and  bequests  as  had  been  contri- 
buted by  the  State.4  The  whole  of  the  State's  contributions 
has  been  frequently  exceeded  many  fold  by  the  gift  of  a 
single  citizen  in  a  single  year.  "European  universities," 
writes  Professor  Goodwin,  "  boast  of  the  imperial  and  national 
governments  which  support  them,  and  support  them  with  noble 
liberality;  but  the  bounty  of  emperors  and  princes,  and  even 
of  republics,  is  precarious,  and  may  fail  with  political  changes. 
Harvard  has  a  more  than  imperial  treasury  in  the  love  and 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  254.  2  Ib.  II.  273,  292. 

8  Ib.  II.  331,  356.  *  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  66. 


16  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

respect  of  her  sons,  and  in  the  confidence  of  the  community." l 
Rarely  has  the  stream  of  wise  beneficence  flowed  with  a  wider 
and  more  even  flood.  In  1840,  the  "productive  estate,  real 
and  personal,"  of  the  College  was  valued  at  six  hundred  and 
forty-six  thousand  dollars  (^'132,104),  "the  result  of  private 
munificence,  or  of  the  wise  management  of  the  Corporation."  2 
In  1891-92  the  income  from  the  estate  amounted  to  four  hun- 
dred and  forty- three  thousand  dollars  (,£90,591),  more  than 
two-thirds  of  the  value  that  the  estate  itself  had  borne  half  a 
century  earlier;  while  the  gifts  and  bequests  in  that  year  were 
no  less  than  five  hundred  and  sixteen  thousand  dollars 
(^105,519).  In  the  three  years  ending  in  1884,  the  Uni- 
versity received  in  bequests  and  gifts,  one  million  and  ninety- 
six  thousand  dollars  (^224,128).  Seven  years  later  we  are 
told  that  "  the  gifts  to  the  University  continue  in  an  ever- 
flowing  stream,  and  amount  to  about  five  hundred  thousand 
dollars  [,£102,249]  annually."  In  1891-92  the  gifts  to  the 
University  exceeded  by  sixty  thousand  dollars  (^12,269)  the 
payments  of  its  three  thousand  students.8  "The  financial 
year,  1892-93,"  reports  the  President  to  the  Board  of  Over- 
seers, "  was  satisfactory  as  regards  the  increase  of  the  funds, 
and  balances  by  gifts  and  bequests,  the  total  increase  of  the 
year  being  five  hundred  and  fifty-two  thousand  dollars 
[;£ii2,88i]."4  Benefactors  of  Harvard,  it  seems,  are  not 
likely  to  suffer  from  "a  satiety  of  commendation."  I  know 
of  nothing  equal  to  this  "satisfactory,"  since  the  days  of 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  41. 

2  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  402. 

8  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  pp.  98,  100;  Annual  Reports, 
1883-84,  p.  45;  Higher  Education  in  Massachusetts,  by  G.  G.  Bush, 
p.  224. 

*  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  47. 


I.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  17 

Harry  Hotspur  and  his  wife.  "'Oh,  my  sweet  Harry,'  says 
she,  'how  many  hast  thou  killed  to-day?'  'Give  my  roan 
horse  a  drench,'  says  he;  and  answers,  'some  fourteen,'  an 
hour  after;  'a  trifle,  a  trifle.'  "  The  extraordinary  moderation 
of  the  President's  words  only  shows  how  splendid  for  many  a 
year  must  have  been  the  benefactions.  Among  the  contribu- 
tions none  is  more  touching  than  the  bequest  of  an  aged 
negress,  a  widow.  In  the  evil  days  of  old,  she  and  her  hus- 
band had  escaped  from  slavery.  He  became  the  coloured 
messenger  of  John  Albion  Andrew,  that  great  Governor  of 
Massachusetts,  who  once  said :  "  I  know  not  what  record  of 
sin  awaits  me  in  the  other  world,  but  this  I  know, —  that  I 
was  never  mean  enough  to  despise  any  man  because  he  was 
poor,  because  he  was  ignorant,  or  because  he  was  black." 
With  the  bequest,  which  is  valued  at  more  than  four  thousand 
dollars  (^817),  a  scholarship  is  to  be  founded  for  the  benefit 
of  poor  and  deserving  coloured  students.1  That  they  need 
not  fear  humiliating  treatment  from  their  comrades  was 
strikingly  shown  by  an  incident  which  occurred  during  my 
visit  to  Cambridge.  A  negro  undergraduate,  going  to  have 
his  hair  cut,  found  that  the  hairdresser  drew  the  line  at  a 
white  man  just  as  in  Nicholas  Nickleby  it  had  been  drawn  at 
a  baker.  It  so  happened  that  the  student  was  a  great  foot- 
ball player.  His  brother-athletes  took  up  his  cause,  and  let 
the  hairdresser  know  that  if  he  persisted  in  his  intolerance, 
he  would  lose  the  custom  of  the  College.  The  man  quickly 
yielded.  The  Legislature  of  Massachusetts  at  once  passed  a 
statute  by  which  throughout  the  Commonwealth  barbers  were 
henceforth  required  to  be  no  respecters  of  persons,  and  to 
shave  without  distinction  of  colour. 

1  Harvard  Graduates'  Magazine,  March,  1894,  p.  442. 
c 


18  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

In  England  rich  men  found  families;  in  America  they 
found  universities,  or  they  enlarge  them.  The  family  often 
falls  away  to  shame;  the  university  remains  forever  a  noble 
and  unsullied  memorial.  On  its  founder  no  stain  is  ever  cast 
by  the  misconduct  of  his  descendants.  It  is  only  the  noble- 
man's title  which,  raising  each  succeeding  generation  above 
the  world,  and  making  it  conspicuous  for  disgrace,  can  cast 
reproach  backwards  upon  the  fair  fame  of  him  who  first  held 
it.  How  many  great  lawyers,  how  many  great  soldiers  and 
sailors,  how  many  great  traders  and  bankers,  by  the  rank  which 
was  given  them  as  an  honour,  have  become  shamed  through 
the  folly  and  misconduct  of  those  who  inherited  it!  Had  it 
not  been  for  the  title,  the  very  existence  of  these  unworthy 
descendants  would  be  unknown;  the  chain  which  bound  them 
to  their  illustrious  forefather  would  be  unseen.  Not  every 
foolish  peer  is  "the  tenth  transmitter  of  some  foolish  face." 
It  is  surprising  how  soon  folly  can  appear  among  the  descenefc- 
ants  of  men  of  the  most  vigorous  and  the  most  subtle  minds. 
Happy  it  is  for  America  that,  free  as  her  citizens  are  by  the 
very  institutions  of  the  country,  from  the  almost  overpowering 
temptation  to  found  a  family,  they  are  diverted  into  a  widely 
different  path  in  the  natural  search  after  distinction !  There 
are,  indeed,  among  them,  men  so  base  that  they  turn  their 
back  on  their  country  where  their  wealth  has  been  made  and 
is  still  accumulating,  and,  doing  nothing  for  its  good,  lead  a 
luxurious  life  in  Europe  amidst  all  the  refinements  of  an 
ancient  civilization.  Others,  unworthy  of  republican  equality, 
become  hangers-on  of  the  English  aristocracy.  "The  wealth 
of  the  New  World,"  writes  Dr.  Wendell  Holmes,  "burrows 
its  way  among  the  privileged  classes  of  the  Old  World."1 

1  R.  W.  Emerson,  by  O.  W.  Holmes,  1885,  p.  180. 


I.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  19 

"  The  gallantry  and  military  spirit  of  the  old  English  nobility  " 
is  no  longer  content  with  "going  into  the  city  to  look  for  a 
fortune."  It  goes  all  the  way  to  New  York;  unless,  as  some- 
times happens,  the  fortune  crosses  the  sea  to  look  for  it. 
There  are  other  Americans  who,  like  the  wretch  Jay  Gould, 
heap  up  riches  for  riches'  sake;  who  living  give  nothing  and 
dying  leave  nothing  to  any  great  and  noble  object.  They 
pass  away  without  showing  that  for  one  single  moment  they 
had  been  touched  by  a  generous  thought.  "They  die,  and 
make  no  sign." 

It  is,  for  the  most  part,  by  men  who  have  been  educated 
at  Harvard,  or  by  those  who  wish  to  commemorate  them,  that 
the  gifts  and  bequests  are  made.  Early  last  year,  for  instance, 
a  widow  "  executed  an  agreement  with  the  President  and  Fel- 
lows to  build  a  Dormitory  for  the  College  at  a  cost  of  about 
one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars  (^30,673),  to  be 
called  Perkins  Hall."  It  is  raised  as  a  memorial  to  three 
graduates  of  her  husband's  family,  the  eldest  of  whom  matri- 
culated in  1717  and  the  youngest  in  1819. l  In  1764,  under 
the  will  of  Thomas  Hancock,  the  Hancock  Professorship  of 
Hebrew  and  other  Oriental  languages  had  been  founded. 
The  endowment  was  but  small.  One  hundred  and  twenty- 
eight  years  later,  a  remote  descendant  of  the  founder  aug- 
mented it  "by  a  residuary  legacy  which  has  thus  far  yielded 
seventy-two  thousand  dollars  (^14, 722). 2  About  the  same 
time  the  College  received  fifty  thousand  dollars  (^10,224) 
under  the  will  of  George  Bemis,  towards  the  foundation  of  a 
Chair  of  International  Law.8  In  the  same  year,  from  the 
estate  of  another  graduate,  George  Draper,  there  came  a 

1  Annual  Reports  t  1892-93,  p.  45.  2  Ib.  p.  30. 

8  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  26. 


20  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

bequest  of  forty-seven  thousand  dollars  (^"96 lo).1  These 
are  but  instances  of  the  never-failing  stream  of  benefactions 
by  which  the  love  of  Harvard  men  is  shown  for  Harvard.  It 
may  be  the  case,  and  no  doubt  sometimes  is  the  case,  that  it 
is  mainly  by  the  desire  of  distinction  that  the  gift  is  prompted. 
Happy  is  .the  country  where  it  is  by  the  University  and  not  by 
the  Crown  that  the  wealthy  trader  is  honoured,  and  where  the 
title  which  is  coveted  and  won  is  not  that  of  Knight  or  Baro- 
net, but  of  Founder ! 

So  constant  and  so  bountiful  are  the  contributions  which 
Harvard  receives,  that  on  them  she  counts  for  most  of  the 
enlargements  which  are  needed  by  the  rapidly  increasing 
number  of  her  students,  and  by  the  fresh  requirements  of 
science  and  learning.  The  fees,  therefore,  that  are  paid 
for  tuition  are  laid  out  in  providing  not  accommodation,  but 
instruction.  New  subjects  are  included  in  each  year's  course, 
and  additional  professorships  are  established.  In  the  briei 
space  of  a  young  man's  life,  Harvard  "has  been  removed  out 
of  the  strait  into  a  broad  place  where  there  is  no  straitness." 

We  of  the  ancient  universities  may  well  look  with  wonder, 
and  even  with  a  certain  touch  of  sadness,  on  these  great 
doings.  Why  does  not  the  same  stream  of  bounty  flow  on 
Oxford  and  Cambridge?  Why,  when  they  make  known  their 
needs, —  and  their  needs  often  are  great, —  does  not  a  gene- 
rous benefactor  at  once  arise.  Balliol  College,  as  a  memorial 
to  its  famous  Master,  is  attempting,  this  very  year,  by  public 
subscription,  to  enlarge  its  foundation  so  that  it  may  do  even 
greater  things  than  it  has  already  done.  The  sum  which  it 
has  received  is  not  one-tenth  part  of  what  this  American  Uni- 
versity receives  almost  every  year;  and  yet  less  than  half  a 
century  ago  the  students  at  Harvard  were  not  twice  as  nume- 
1  Harvard  Graduates'  Magazine,  January,  1893,  p.  252. 


I.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  21 

rous  as  those  of  Balliol  at  the  present  time.  In  Cambridge, 
by  the  great  fall  in  rents,  the  salary  of  the  Downing  Professor 
of  Medicine  has  dwindled  to  two  hundred  pounds  a  year. 
The  post  lately  became  vacant  by  the  resignation  of  the  Pro- 
fessor. "It  will  be  somewhat  difficult,"  wrote  the  Times? 
"  to  obtain  a  suitable  successor  owing  to  the  fact  that  the  pro- 
fessorship is  most  insufficiently  endowed."  All  the  fame 
that  Cambridge  has  gained  by  her  great  School  of  Medicine 
apparently  does  nothing  for  her.  In  the  American  Cam- 
bridge, such  an  insufficiency  in  so  important  a  professorship 
could  scarcely  exist;  it  certainly  would  not  last  long.  Ox- 
ford2 is  wronged  by  the  men  who,  even,  after  all  the  reforms 
which  have  been  made,  are  overpaid  for  the  work  they  do. 
Much  of  the  work  done  in  the  University  is  but  ill-requited. 
Many  a  College  tutor  measures  out  his  labour  not  by  what  he 
receives,  but  by  a  noble  zeal  for  learning  and  for  the  welfare 
of  his  pupils.  Some  of  them,  I  think,  would  do  more  good 
if  they  laboured  less.  The  mischief  from  over-teaching  is 
not  much  less  than  the  mischief  from  under-teaching.  The 
over-taught  student,  when  his  guide  is  from  his  side,  gropes 
helplessly  along  the  road  of  learning.  Be  that  as  it  may,  the 
work  that  is  done  in  the  University  is  generous  in  its  total 
amount  when  measured  by  its  reward.  Those  who  are  over- 
paid are  few  in  number  compared  with  the  whole  body,  but 
they  are  conspicuous  by  their  position.  To  them  must  be 
added  the  holders  of  prize  fellowships, —  men  who  for  the 
most  part  do  nothing,  and  are  expected  to  do  nothing,  either 
for  learning  or  even  for  teaching.  In  many  departments 
there  is  need  of  greater  and  of  new  endowments.  These 
will  flow  in  but  slowly,  if  they  flow  in  at  all,  so  long  as  it  is 

1  January  31,  1894. 

^  I  say  nothing  of  Cambridge,  of  which  I  know  but  little. 


22  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  I. 

known  in  the  country  that  large  sums  are  still  wasted,  as  wasted 
they  most  certainly  are.  No  one  can  reproach  Harvard  with 
an  ill  use  of  her  funds;  no  one,  I  believe,  can  point  to 
a  single  man  who  does  not  at  least  do  a  fair  day's  work  for  a 
fair  day's  pay.  "The  College  salaries,"  reported  the  Presi- 
dent, ten  years  ago,  "have  remained  stationary  for  fifteen 
years,  and  all  that  while  the  College  has  been  demanding  of 
its  teachers  more  and  more  learning,  labour,  enthusiasm,  and 
personal  influence."1  Harvard  has  no  prize  appointments  to 
give  away.  She  is  above  all  favouritism.  She  lends  no  ear 
to  the  claims  of  religious  orthodoxy  or  of  party  politics.  She 
seeks  the  ablest  teacher  she  can  find,  and  she  pays  him  not 
extravagantly,  but  not  illiberally.  Whenever  a  need  for  help 
arises,  she  appeals  with  confidence  to  her  children,  because 
she  can  show  that  she  makes  a  wise  use  of  all  that  is  intrusted 
to  her.  Great  as  are  her  endowments,  greater  still  are  her 
needs,  for  she  is  ever  advancing,  ever  taking  in  fresh  branches 
of  knowledge,  ever  drawing  to  herself  fresh  students.  In  the 
annual  report  made  by  the  President  to  the  Board  of  Over- 
seers, the  whole  state  of  the  University  —  its  work,  its  receipts, 
its  expenses,  its  hopes,  its  fears,  its  requirements  —  is  all 
clearly  set  forth  before  the  whole  community.  As  they  read 
it  and  think  of  the  lowly  past,  "  they  look  backward  with 
exultation  and  thanksgiving  and  forward  with  confidence  and 
high  resolve."2  It  is  this  exultation  and  thanksgiving,  this 
confidence  and  high  resolve,  which  form  one  of  the  chief 
sources  whence  spring  the  great  benefactions  which  are  pour- 
ing in  upon  the  old  College  from  her  proud  and  grateful 
children. 

1  Annual  Reports,  1883-84,  p.  45. 

2  From  the  address  of  President  Eliot  at  the  Commemoration  in  1886. 
Harvard  University,  2^oth  Anniversary,  p.  263. 


CHAPTER  II. 

The  Foundation  of  Harvard.  —  Cambridge  in  England  and  Cambridge 
in  New  England.  —  "Fair  Harvard."  —  Emmanuel  College. — The 
Washington  Elm.  —  General  Washington  a  Doctor  of  Laws.  —  The 
University  at  Concord.  —  An  Overbearing  Treasurer.  —  Harvard  and 
Slavery. 

THE  pleasantness  of  Harvard  I  have  already  described. 
It  is  a  spot  that  a  student  can  love.  It  is  indeed 
"Fair  Harvard."  Happily  it  has,  moreover,  that  other  great 
quality  without  which  a  university  seems  maimed  and  imper- 
fect, —  a  quality  which  no  munificence  can  confer.  It  is 
venerable.  Measured  by  the  age  of  the  earliest  foundations 
of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  it  is  almost  in  its  youth.  Never- 
theless, when  it  was  founded,  Milton  was  still  "  inglorious,"  and 
Cromwell  a  quiet  country  gentleman.  Two  years  before  our 
Queen  was  crowned  at  Westminster  it  kept  its  two  hundredth 
anniversary.  In  the  speeches  made  on  that  great  day  it 
proudly  carried  back  its  past  to  that  far-distant  time  when  its 
parent,  the  great  English  university,  was  founded  on  the  banks 
of  the  Cam.  It  was  by  a  small  knot  of  Cambridge  men,  men 
who  may  have  known  "  young  Lycidas,"  that  the  foundations  of 
the  American  Cambridge  were  laid  in  the  midst  of  dangers  and 
hardships.  John  Harvard  was  a  Master  of  Arts  of  Emmanuel 
College.  Story,  who  at  the  time  of  the  celebration  of  the  two 
hundredth  anniversary  of  the  College  in  1836,  by  his  lectures  on 
law,  was  making  Harvard  known  to  the  Old  World,  gave  as 

23 


24  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

his  toast  at  the  banquet :  "  Our  Ancient  Mother,  the  Uni- 
versity of  Cambridge  in  Old  England  —  Salve  magna  parens, 
—  Magna  virum"  " The  very  spot,"  he  said,  " where  we 
are  assembled  is  consecrated  by  a  thousand  endearing  associa- 
tions of  the  past.  The  very  name  of  Cambridge  compels  us 
to  cast  our  eyes  across  the  Atlantic,  and  brings  up  a  glowing 
gratitude  for  our  unspeakable  obligations  to  the  parent  uni- 
versity whose  name  we  proudly  bear,  and  have  borne  for  two 
centuries." l 

These  Harvard  men  were  not  content  with  doing  honour  to 
the  English  Cambridge.  They  were  more  than  members  of  a 
university;  they  were  citizens  of  a  great  Confederation  of 
States.  They  were  New  Englanders  —  New  Englanders  not 
forgetful  of  the  Old  England  from  which  they  were  sprung. 
"  Gratitude  to  the  noble  country  of  our  fathers "  was  next 
given  as  a  toast  by  Dr.  John  Warren,  the  nephew  of  General 
Warren,  who  fell  at  Bunker  Hill.  "  Let  us  imagine  ourselves?' 
he  said,  "to  have  sprung  from  any  other  nation  of  Europe, 
and  how  different,  probably,  would  have  been  our  condition. 
To  England  we  owe  the  vigorous  freedom  of  thought  which, 
there  taking  its  origin,  was  transplanted  by  our  ancestors  to  a 
virgin  soil,  and  has  grown  with  a  luxuriance  beyond  example. 
A  common  parentage,  a  common  language,  a  community  of 
feeling,  have  given  us  all  the  privileges  of  English  sentiment, 
learning,  and  ingenuity.  ...  In  our  parent,  England,  we 
have  the  happiness  to  see  the  great  supporter  and  defender  of 
liberal  institutions  throughout  the  world.  ...  I  do  not 
hesitate  to  say  that  there  is  a  greatness  in  the  conduct  of 
England  during  the  convulsions  of  Europe  [the  Napoleonic 
wars]  which  has  no  parallel  in  the  story  of  admired  Greece  or 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  675. 


II.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  25 

Rome.  The  efforts  of  these  nations  were  inspirited  by  a  love 
of  conquest,  a  love  of  power,  a  desire  of  revenge.  England 
was  influenced  by  a  higher  principle  —  a  determined  and 
unconquerable  opposition  to  despotism." 1 

This  speech  was  made  but  one  and  twenty  years  after  the 
close  of  a  war  which  had  been  provoked  by  our  overbearing 
violence  on  the  seas,  and  which  was  disgraced  by  an  act  of  bar- 
barity worthy  of  a  horde  of  Cossacks.  The  rising  town  of 
Washington,  the  capital  of  the  United  States,  had  been  burnt  to 
the  ground  by  Englishmen.  "Few  more  shameful  acts  are 
recorded  in  our  history;  and  it  was  the  more  shameful  in 
that  it  was  done  under  strict  orders  from  the  government 
at  home."2  Story's  memory  went  back  to  the  War  of  Inde- 
pendence. In  the  small  seaport  town  in  which  his  childhood 
was  passed,  peace,  when  at  last  it  came,  found  nine  hundred 
widows  whose  husbands  had  fallen  fighting  on  sea  or  land,  all 
victims  to  the  mad  folly  of  our  government.3  Had  some 
Englishman  been  present  at  this  celebration,  when  he  heard 
such  speeches  as  these,  he  might  well  have  started  from  his 
seat  and  exclaimed  :  — 

"Some  write  their  wrongs  in  marble;  you,  more  just, 
Stoop  down  serene  and  write  them  in  the  dust." 

Not  all  the  speakers  were  a  Story  and  a  Warren.  The 
American  Eagle  was  to  flap  her  wings  and  make  her  screams 
heard,  even  in  an  ancient  seat  of  learning.  Edward  Everett 
was  there,  the  president  of  the  day,  the  perfection  and  model 
of  all  that  is  bad  in  the  oratory  of  the  United  States.  The 
following  passage  shows  what  was  esteemed  eloquence  in 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  679. 

2  J.  R.  Green's  Short  History  of  the  English  People,  p.  808. 
8  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  I.  31. 


26  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

a  country  where  Daniel  Webster,  still  in  the  fulness  of  his 
power,  was  showing  how  sublime  is  the  force  of  simplicity. 
"Yes,  in  the  very  dawn  of  independence,  while  the  lions  of 
land  yet  lay  slumbering  in  the  long  shadows  of  the  throne, 
an  eaglet,  bred  in  the  delicate  air  of  freedom  which  fanned 
the  academic  groves,  had,  from  his  '  coign  of  vantage  '  on 
yonder  tower,  drunk  the  first  rosy  sparkle  of  the  sun  of  liberty 
into  his  calm,  undazzled  eye,  and  whetted  his  talons  for  the 
conflict." l  It  was  not  in  this  mould  that  Lincoln  formed  that 
rugged  eloquence  which  was  heard  at  Gettysburg  over  the 
graves  of  the  soldiers  who  fell  in  the  great  war.  Whoever  was 
his  master  in  speech,  most  certainly  it  was  not  a  rhetorician. 

It  was  for  the  Centennial  Celebration  of  1836  that  Fair 
Harvard  was  written  —  that  song  which,  as  the  year  comes 
round,  is  sung  at  every  commencement  by  the  great  gathering 
of  Harvard  men.  It  begins,  — 

"  Fair  Harvard !  thy  sons  to  thy  Jubilee  throng."  * 

and  ends,  — 

"  Be  the  herald  of  Light  and  the  bearer  of  Love, 
Till  the  stock  of  the  Puritans  die." 

The  best  verse  is  the  following  :  — 

"  To  thy  bowers  we  were  led  in  the  bloom  of  our  youth, 

From  the  home  of  our  free-roving  years, 
When  our  fathers  had  warned,  and  our  mothers  had  prayed, 

And  our  sisters  had  blest  through  their  tears. 
Thou  then  wert  our  parent,  —  the  nurse  of  our  souls,  — 

We  were  moulded  to  manhood  by  thee, 
Till,  freighted  with  treasure-thoughts,  friendships,  and  hopes, 

Thou  didst  launch  us  on  Destiny's  sea." 

The  speeches  on  this  great  day  must  have  been  brief — brief 
for  the  speakers  of  the  Old  World,  preternaturally  brief  for  the 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  658. 


CO          C 

oo     . 


u  ' 

O  « 

UJ  c 

3  1 

8  3 


II.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  27 

orators  of  the  New.  It  was  not  till  the  thirty- second  toast  that 
the  ladies  were  reached.  There  were  forty  toasts  in  all.  "  The 
hour  of  eight  o'clock  having  now  arrived,  Josiah  Quincy,  Junior, 
moved,  '  That  this  Assembly  of  the  Alumni  be  adjourned  to 
meet  at  this  place  on  the  8th  of  September,  1936.'  " *  In  spite 
of  the  forty  toasts  it  was  not,  so  far  as  I  can  make  out,  eight 
o'clock  in  the  morning  when  the  Assembly  broke  up,  but  only 
eight  o'clock  in  the  evening.  The  moderation  of  each  speaker 
which  allowed  forty  toasts  to  be  gone  through  in  five  or  six 
hours  at  most  is  in  striking  contrast  with  the  speech  delivered 
at  Oxford  not  twenty  years  later  by  the  Vice-Chancellor. 
There,  too,  it  was  a  great  day ;  for  the  orator  and  scholar, 
the  Earl  of  Derby,  was  welcomed  as  the  new  Chancellor  of  the 
University,  the  successor  of  the  great  Duke.  Some  of  the  best 
speakers  of  England  were  guests  at  the  banquet,  and  a  fine  flow 
of  varied  eloquence  was  looked  for.  There  was  a  flow,  but 
most  of  it  came  from  one  source.  The  Vice-Chancellor,  a  man 
insignificant  except  for  his  piety,  spoke  for  two  hours  and  more 
at  a  stretch.  By  the  time  he  sat  down  the  audience  was  ex- 
hausted, the  orators  were  dejected,  and  the  reporters,  so  I  am 
told,  were  drunk. 

At  Harvard  the  length  of  the  adjournment  was  halved  by 
the  next  generation,  who  met  in  November,  1886.  Dr.  Oliver 
Wendell  Holmes,  who  in  1836,  at  the  dinner,  had  sung  a 
song  which  he  had  written  for  the  great  day,  half  a  century 
later  was  the  chosen  poet  of  this  second  commemoration. 
Lowell,  as  an  undergraduate,  had  witnessed  the  earlier  gather- 
ing :  he  was  now  the  Orator.  Our  English  Cambridge  was 
represented  by  the  Master  of  St.  John's,  and  Emmanuel  College 
—  John  Harvard's  College  —  by  Dr.  Creighton,  Senior  Fellow 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  706. 


28  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

and  Professor  of  Ecclesiastical  History.1  Lowell  ended  his 
oration  by  welcoming  the  guests,  above  all,  the  guests  from 
the  foreign  seats  of  learning.  In  the  name  of  the  Alumni 
"  I  give,"  he  said,  "  a  special  greeting  to  the  gentleman  who 
brings  the  message  of  John  Harvard's  College,  Emmanuel. 
The  welcome  we  give  him  could  not  be  warmer  than  that 
which  we  offer  to  his  colleagues ;  but  we  cannot  help  feeling 
that  in  pressing  his  hand  our  own  instinctively  draws  a  little 
more  tightly,  as  with  a  sense  of  nearer  kindred."  This 
passage,  we  are  told,  was  more  loudly  applauded  than  almost 
any  other  part  of  his  speech.2  That  "  blood  is  thicker  than 
water  "  was  felt  not  only  by  the  American  commodore,  when  he 
opened  fire  on  the  Chinese  forts  in  support  of  our  hard-pressed 
gun-boats,  but  by  these  New  Englanders  who  had  gathered 
together  to  celebrate  the  foundation  of  their  University  by  their 
English  forefathers. 

Two  years  earlier  than  this  Commemoration  when  Emmanuel , 
College  had  celebrated  the  three  hundredth  anniversary  of  its 
foundation,  "  two  distinguished  alumni  of  Harvard,"  said  Dr. 
Creighton,  "  Professor  Lowell  and  Professor  Norton,  no  less  by 
the  dignity  of  their  presence  than  by  the  eloquence  of  their 
speech,  had  almost  succeeded  in  converting  our  festival  into  a 
celebration  of  Harvard  College  in  its  ancestral  soil  of  England." 
"  The  connection  of  Emmanuel  College  with  Harvard  Univer- 
sity," he  continued,  "  is  an  episode  of  unique  picturesqueness 
in  academic  annals,  and  sets  Emmanuel  College  in  a  con- 
spicuous place  in  the  intellectual  history  of  mankind."  3 

1  Now  Bishop  of  Peterborough,  formerly  fellow  and  tutor  of  Merton 
College,  Oxford. 

2  Harvard  University,  2$oth  Anniversary,  pp.  37,  236. 
«  Ib.  pp.  277,  303. 


II.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  29 

While  Harvard  thus  keeps  up  her  hold  on  the  past,  she  at 
times  somewhat  needlessly  breaks  with  old  customs.  When 
Lowell  was  appointed  Minister  to  Spain,  he  wrote  to  a  friend  : 
"  You  must  remember  that  I  am  '  H.  E.'  [His  Excellency] 
now  myself,  and  can  show  a  letter  with  that  superscription.  I 
dare  say  I  shall  enjoy  it  after  I  get  there,  but  at  present  it  is 
altogether  a  bore  to  be  honourabled  at  every  turn.  The  world 
is  a  droll  affair.  And  yet,  between  ourselves,  dear  Grace,  I 
should  be  pleased  if  my  father  could  see  me  in  capitals  on  the 
Triennial  Catalogue.  You  remember  Johnson's  pathetic  letter 
to  Chesterfield.  How  often  I  think  of  it  as  I  grow  older  !  "  l 
This  Catalogue  —  "  such  is  the  rage  of  innovation  "  —  is  no 
longer  triennial  but  quinquennial,  and  the  capitals  are  no  longer 
preserved ;  nay,  it  has  suffered  still  more  unworthy  treatment, 
for  it  is  now  printed  in  the  vulgar  tongue.  "  Since  Harvard 
has  grown  to  a  University/'  writes  the  editor  of  Lowell's  Letters, 
"  the  Catalogue  has  been  deprived  alike  of  the  dignity  of  its 
traditional  Latin,  and  of  those  capitals  in  which  the  sons  of 
hers  who  had  attained  to  public  official  distinction,  such  as 
that  of  Member  of  Congress,  or  Governor  of  a  State,  or  Judge 
of  a  United  States  Court,  were  elevated  above  their  fellow- 
students.  To  have  one's  name  in  capitals  in  the  Catalogue 
was  a  reward  worth  achieving."  Nevertheless,  there  must  have 
been  a  certain  incongruity  in  a  Catalogue  in  which  Caleb  Gush- 
ing was  printed  large,  and  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  William  H. 
Prescott,  Wendell  Phillips,  and  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  were 
printed  small. 

^Letters  ofj.  R.  Lowell,  II.  210.  "The  notice  which  you  have  been 
pleased  to  take  of  my  labours,  had  it  been  early,  had  been  kind ;  but  it 
has  been  delayed  till  I  am  indifferent,  and  cannot  enjoy  it;  till  I  am  soli- 
tary, and  cannot  impart  it;  till  I  am  known,  and  do  not  want  it."  —  Bos- 
well's  Life  of  Johnson,  I.  262. 


30  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Harvard,  like  Oxford,  has  been  the  seat  of  a  camp,  and  has 
seen  learning  yield  to  the  rough  needs  of  war.  It  was  on  the 
Common,  not  a  furlong  from  the  College,  beneath  the  graceful 
branches  of  an  American  elm,  that,  as  an  inscription  shows, 
"Washington  first  took  command  of  the  American  army,  July 
3,  1775."  The  Common  was  not  the  pleasant  spot  that  it  now 
is,  with  its  green  lawn,  its  groves,  and  its  trim  paths.  It  was 
"  an  unenclosed  dust  plain,"  across  which  the  drovers,  on  their 
way  to  Boston  market,  used  to  take  their  herds  of  cattle.  The 
two  English  cannon  stamped  G.  R.,  which  stand  in  the  middle 
as  trophies  of  war,  had  not  yet  been  captured.  They  were 
helping  to  hold  Boston  against  its  own  citizens.  Not  fifty  years 
had  gone  by  since  the  College,  in  a  loyal  address,  had  assured 
another  G.  R.  that  "  they  had  shed  tears  over  the  grave  of  the 
great  King  his  Father." 1  In  July,  1875,  the  centenary  of  this 
famous  day  was  celebrated.  "  We  have  still  standing,"  wrote 
Lowell,  "  the  elm  under  which  Washington  took  command  of 
the  American  (till  then  provincial}  army,  and  under  which 
also  Whitefield  had  preached  some  thirty  years  before."  2  The 
tree,  though  broken,  still  retains  much  of  its  gracefulness. 
Among  all  the  spots,  famous  in  the  noble  history  of  man's 
struggle  for  freedom,  it  is  by  no  means  the  least  worthy  of 
veneration.  As  I  stood  by  it  and  read  the  inscription,  there 
came  into  my  mind  the  words  of  the  old  English  Tory,  the 
stern  enemy  of  American  Independence  —  "  that  man  is  little 
to  be  envied  whose  patriotism  would  not  gain  force  upon  the 
plain  of  Marathon."  This,  indeed,  was  "  ground  dignified  by 
wisdom,  bravery,  and  virtue."  Washington,  for  many  months, 
had  his  headquarters  in  a  fine  mansion  hard  by,  which  is  now 
generally  known,  not  by  his  name,  but  by  Longfellow's.  Here 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  383.  2  Letters  ofj.  R.  Lowell,  II.  159. 


II.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  31 

the  poet  had  his  quiet  home  for  the  greater  part  of  his  life. 
Washington's  memorials  are  so  many  that  he  can  afford  to 
yield  one  to  literature.  Cedant  arma  togae. 

Few  of  the  Harvard  students  had  witnessed  the  great  scene 
in  the  world's  drama  which  had  been  played  beneath  the  elm. 
Two  months  earlier  the  Committee  of  Safety  had  dispersed 
them  to  their  homes.  It  was  at  Harvard  that  many  years 
earlier  Samuel  Adams,  the  cousin  of  two  Presidents  of  the 
United  States,  had  maintained  in  a  thesis  read  before  the 
College  the  lawfulness  of  rebellion.  In  1768,  seven  years 
before  the  war  broke  out,  the  Graduating  Class  had  unani- 
mously voted  "to  take  their  degrees  in  the  manufactures  of 
the  country,"  and  had  appeared  at  Commencement  in  untaxed 
home-manufactured  garments.1  The  following  year,  the  Gov- 
ernor of  the  Commonwealth  had  attempted  to  overawe  the 
House  of  Representatives  by  a  display  of  military  force.  Can- 
non was  pointed  at  the  door  of  the  State  House  in  which  they 
met.  They  refused  to  continue  their  sittings.  The  Governor, 
who  had  received  his  orders  from  England,  said  that  he  had 
no  authority  to  take  away  the  troops.  He  did,  however,  all 
that  a  reasonable  man  could  do.  Not  being  able  to  remove 
the  cannon  from  the  Legislature,  he  removed  the  Legislature 
from  the  cannon.  He  adjourned  the  House  to  Harvard  Col- 
lege, where  it  met  in  the  Chapel.  One  of  the  Fellows  has 
described  in  a  letter  written  at  the  time,  how  "  this  removal 
hinders  the  scholars  in  their  studies.  The  young  gentlemen 
are  already  taken  up  with  politics.  They  have  caught  the 
spirit  of  the  times.  Their  declamations  and  forensic  disputes 
breathe  the  spirit  of  liberty.  This  has  always  been  encouraged, 
but  they  have  sometimes  been  wrought  up  to  such  a  spirit  of 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  163. 


32  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

enthusiasm,  that  it  has  been  difficult  for  their  Tutors  to  keep 
them  within  close  bounds;  but  their  Tutors  are  fearful  of 
giving  too  great  a  check  to  a  disposition  which  may  hereafter 
fill  the  country  with  patriots."  It  was  no  doubt  the  memory 
of  "this  spirit  of  liberty"  which  led  Governor  Hancock  to 
speak  of  Harvard  as  "  in  some  sense  the  parent  and  nurse  of 
the  late  happy  Revolution  in  this  Commonwealth."  All  the 
Massachusetts  men  who  signed  the  Declaration  of  Indepen- 
dence were  her  children.  There  were,  however,  a  few  Tories 
among  the  undergraduates  "  who  were  in  the  practice  of  bring- 
ing '  Indian  tea '  into  Commons,  and  drinking  it  to  show  their 
loyalty.  The  Governors  of  the  Seminary  advised  them  not  to 
do  it  in  future,  '  as  it  was  a  source  of  grief  and  uneasiness  to 
many  of  the  students,  and  as  the  use  of  it  is  disagreeable  to  the 
people  of  the  country  in  general.'  "  1 

The  "enthusiasm  "  which  the  Tutors  were  unwilling  to  check 
in  these  youthful  patriots  broke  out  in  a  rebellion  within  tfre 
College.  While  outside  the  war  was  raging,  the  three  upper 
Classes  assembled  in  the  Hall,  and  voted  to  send  a  memorial 
to  the  Corporation,  in  which  they  charged  their  President  with 
"  impiety,  heterodoxy,  unfitness  for  the  office  of  preacher  of 
the  Christian  religion,  and  still  more  for  that  of  President." 
"  There  was,"  writes  Quincy,  "  not  a  shadow  of  foundation  for 
any  of  these  charges,  except  the  last."  A  Committee  of  twelve 
"  were  appointed  to  wait  upon  the  President,  and  invite  him  to 
resign  his  office."  The  poor  man,  who  was  ignorant  of  his 
unpopularity,  was  so  deeply  touched  that  he  resolved  at  once  to 
retire.  It  was  on  Saturday  that  the  deputation  had  waited  on 
him ;  on  the  following  Monday,  after  morning  prayers,  he 
detained  the  students,  and  told  them  that  he  should  resign. 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II,  148,  163,  164,  244. 


II.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  33 

"  His  family,  he  said,  would  be  thrown  destitute  on  the 
world,  and  he  intimated  that  resolutions  of  a  favourable 
character  might  be  of  service  to  him.  This  conduct  subdued 
their  rebellious  spirits."  They  met  again,  and  "with  like 
unanimity  passed  directly  opposite  resolutions,  excepting  only 
his  unfitness  for  the  office  of  President."1  The  ferment  was 
slow  in  subsiding.  Channing,  who  entered  Harvard  about 
fifteen  years  later,  describes  "  a  state  of  great  insubordination, 
and  the  almost  total  absence  of  the  respect  due  to  individuals 
[the  teachers]  of  so  much  worth.  The  French  Revolution 
had  diseased  the  imagination  and  unsettled  the  understanding 
of  men  everywhere.  The  authority  of  the  past  was  gone." 2 

When,  in  1775,  hostilities  began  between  the  mother 
country  and  the  Colonies,  the  seat  of  war  in  the  opening  years 
was  too  near  for  the  peaceful  life  of  a  university,  and  moreover 
the  College  buildings  were  needed  for  barracks.  At  the  end  of 
the  vacation  the  students  assembled  at  Concord,  fifteen  miles 
or  so  from  Cambridge.  There  lodgings  were  provided  for  a 
hundred  and  twenty-five.  Part  of  the  library  also  was  removed 
and  arranged  on  shelves  in  a  private  house.3  The  Concord 
"  turnpike  " 4 —  since  dignified  by  the  name  of  Avenue  —  crossed 
the  Common.  It  was  at  Concord  that  the  first  shots  had  been 
fired  and  the  first  blood  shed.  In  June  of  the  following  year 
the  students  once  more  assembled  in  Harvard.  The  English 
army  had  abandoned  Boston,  and  there  was  no  longer  an 
enemy  in  their  gates.  Their  buildings  had  suffered  from  the 
military  occupation.  From  the  roof  of  the  hall  lead  had  been 
stripped,  no  doubt  to  be  turned  into  bullets.  Before  long,  Cam- 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  179. 

*  Life  of  W.  E.  Channing,  I.  59.  «  Ib.  II.  166. 

4  In  America  turnpike  is  commonly  used  for  turnpike-road. 


34  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

bridge  was  again  to  be  crowded,  not  this  time  with  armed  sol- 
diers, but  with  prisoners  of  war,  the  remnant  of  Burgoyne's  army. 
In  Lowell's  day  there  were  still  to  be  seen  in  Massachusetts 
Hall  the  hooks  from  which  had  swung  the  hammocks  of  the 
red-coats.1  Late  last  century  hooks  for  a  very  different  pur- 
pose were  fixed  up  in  an  Oxford  College.  One  of  the  Fellows 
of  University  College  whom  I  was  visiting  many  years  ago  told 
me  that  he  had  that  day  received  a  letter  from  an  aged  clergy- 
man, a  former  member  of  the  College,  asking  him  to  see 
whether  in  the  ceiling  of  a  certain  room  a  couple  of  hooks 
were  still  there.  From  the  hooks  his  hunting-breeches  used 
to  be  suspended,  into  which  he  let  himself  down  from  a  pair 
of  steps.  They  were,  according  to  the  fashion,  too  tight  to 
draw  on  in  the  ordinary  way. 

The  blockade  of  the  coast  by  the  English  fleet,  cutting  off  the 
supply  of  luxuries  from  abroad,  compelled  the  Corporation  to 
pass  the  following  resolutions  on  August  11,1777:  —  * 

"  Whereas  by  law  9th  of  chap.  vi.  it  is  provided, '  that  there  shall  always 
be  chocolate,  tea,  coffee,  and  milk  for  breakfast,  with  bread  and  biscuit 2  and 
butter,'  and  whereas  the  foreign  articles  above  mentioned  are  now  not  to 
be  procured  without  great  difficulty  and  at  a  very  exorbitant  price;  Voted, 
That  the  Steward  shall  provide  at  the  common  charge  only  bread  or  biscuit 
and  milk  for  breakfast;  and  if  any  of  the  scholars  choose  tea,  coffee,  or 
chocolate  they  shall  procure  those  articles  for  themselves;  and  likewise  the 
sugar  and  butter  to  be  used  with  them;  and  if  any  scholars  choose  to  have 
their  milk  boiled,  or  thickened  with  flour,  if  it  may  be  had,  or  with  meal, 
the  Steward,  having  reasonable  notice,  shall  provide  it."  3 

On  the  day  year  on  which  Washington  had  taken  command 
of  the  American  army,  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws  was  con- 

1  Literary  Essays,  by  J.  R.  Lowell,  1890,  I.  56. 

2  Biscuit,  according  to  the  American  use  of  the  word,  is  hot  rolls. 
8  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  541. 


ii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  35 

ferred  on  him  by  Harvard.  He  was  the  first  man  to  be  thus 
distinguished  by  the  University.  It  was  indeed  a  noble  begin- 
ning of  the  long  line  of  honours.  His  diploma  described  him 
as  :  — 

"  Vir  illustrissimus,  Georgius  Washington,  Armiger,  Exercitus  Colonia- 
rum  in  America  Foederatarum  Imperator  prseclarus  .  .  :  qui,  postulante 
Patria  sedem  in  Virginia  amoenissimam  et  res  proprias  perlubenter  reliquit, 
ut  .  .  .  Nov-Angliam  ab  armis  Britannorum  iniquis  et  crudelibus  liberaret, 
et  Colonias  cseteras  tueretur,  et  qui  .  .  .  ab  urbe  Bostonia  .  .  .  naves  et 
copias  hostium  in  fugam  praecipitem  et  probrosam  deturebavit,1  adeo  ut 
cives,  plurimis  duritiis  et  saevitiis  oppressi,  tandem  salvi  laetentur,  villse 
vicinae  quiescant  atque  sedibus  suis  Academia  nostra  restituatur. 

"  Sciatis  igitur  quod  nos  .  .  .  Dominum  supradictum,  summo  honore 
dignum,  Georgium  Washington,  Doctorem  Utriusque  Juris,  turn  Naturae  et 
Gentium,  turn  Civilis,  statuimus  et  creavimus."  2 

A  year  earlier,  a  few  days  before  the  fight  at  Concord,  Oxford 
had  conferred  a  like  degree  on  Samuel  Johnson,  on  the  recom- 
mendation of  its  Chancellor,  the  Prime  Minister,  Lord  North, 
in  return,  there  can  be  little  doubt,  for  Taxation  no  Tyranny ; 
an  Answer  to  the  Resolutions  and  Addresses  of  the  American 
Congress.  It  was  thus  that  "  the  Whigs  of  America,  Whigs 
fierce  for  liberty  and  disdainful  of  dominion,  who  multiply  with 
the  fecundity  of  their  own  rattlesnakes,"3  replied  to  the  honour 
conferred  by  the  Tory  statesman  and  the  Tory  university  on 
the  Tory  pamphleteer. 

Even  before  the  Revolution  was  brought  to  an  end  the 
patriots  of  Harvard  found  that,  not  only  in  a  monarchy  but 
also  in  a  democracy,  injustice  and  insolence  may  have  to  be 
borne  and  borne  patiently.  George  III.  was  down,  but  Gov- 
ernor Hancock  was  up.  In  an  evil  day  for  the  University  that 

1  In  this  headlong  and  shameful  flight  the  two  cannons  that  now  stand 
on  Cambridge  Common  had  been  thrown  into  the  harbour. 

2  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  506.  8  BoswelPs  Life  of  Johnson,  II.  314. 


36  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

favourite  of  the  people  had  been  appointed  Treasurer.  "  He 
embarrassed  it  during  a  period  of  nearly  twenty  years."  He 
would  neither  discharge  the  duties  of  his  office  nor  resign  his 
post.  The  Corporation,  after  patiently  waiting  for  two  or  three 
years,  appointed  his  successor.  To  conciliate  the  great  man 
they  passed  a  vote,  that  a  committee  should  "  wait  on  the 
Hon.  John  Hancock,  Esq.,  with  the  most  respectful  compli- 
ments of  the  Corporation,  and  request  that  he  should  permit 
his  portrait  to  be  forthwith  conveyed  to  the  College,  and  placed 
in  the  Philosophy  Chamber,  by  that  of  his  late  honourable 
uncle."  He  neither  sent  his  portrait  nor  settled  his  accounts. 
He  had  been  "  exposed  to  those  severe  trials  of  human  char- 
acter,—  great  wealth  suddenly  acquired  and  unbounded  and 
long-continued  popularity."  So  powerful  was  his  position  that 
the  Corporation  did  not  dare  to  bring  him  before  a  court  of 
law.  They  could  scarcely  have  been  worse  off  had  they  had  to 
deal  with  George  III.  himself.  It  was  not  till  full  eleven  years 
after  their  first  demand  that  he  condescended  to  state  the 
amount  of  the  balance  still  owing  by  him  to  the  College.  On 
being  pressed  for  payment  he  would  do  nothing  more  than 
give  a  bond  and  security.  It  was  in  vain  that  the  distress 
of  the  Professors  was  laid  before  him.  Their  salaries  were 
unpaid,  but  neither  interest  nor  principal  could  be  got  out  of 
the  great  man.  He  died  in  1 793,  leaving  ample  means,  but 
the  debt  still  owing.  It  was  not  till  eight  or  nine  years  later 
that  his  heirs  discharged  it.  With  some  reason  does  President 
Quincy  remark  at  the  end  of  this  strange  story  :  "  In  republics 
popularity  is  the  form  of  power  most  apt  to  corrupt  its  pos- 
sessor, and  to  tempt  him,  for  party  ends  or  personal  interest,  to 
trample  on  right,  or  set  principle  at  defiance."1 

1  Quincy's  Harvard^  II.  182,  203-209,  523. 


II.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  37 

However  much  Harvard  distinguished  herself  in  the  long 
struggle  for  the  independence  of  the  Colonies,  unhappily  she 
did  not  always  range  herself  on  the  side  of  liberty.  All 
through  the  opening  scenes  of  the  great  struggle  between 
freedom  and  slavery  she  was  the  champion  of  the  slave-holder. 
When  on  one  side  stood  the  President  and  Congress,  the 
Legislatures  of  almost  all  the  States,  the  judicature,  the  Civil 
Service,  the  Churches,  the  mobs,  the  wealthy,  the  cowardly,  all 
the  "  safe  "  men,  all  the  "  moderate  "  men,  and  on  the  other 
side  William  Lloyd  Garrison  and  his  little  band,  "  harsh  as 
truth  and  uncompromising  as  justice,"  she  chose  the  part  of 
shame.  To  serve  the  Union,  stained  and  darkened  though  it 
was  by  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law,  she  was  ready  to  sacrifice 
justice,  mercy,  and  honour.  She  showed  that  even  in  a  re- 
public a  university  is  too  apt  to  side  with  the  powers  that  be 
against  the  right  that  ought  to  be.  Not  even  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge have  ever  disgraced  themselves  more  than  the  New 
England  University  by  taking  the  part  of  the  strong  and  the 
privileged  against  the  weak  and  the  helpless.  What  Loyal 
Address  to  the  Crown  was  more  shameful  than  the  toast  given 
at  the  Centennial  Celebration  in  1836  :  "  Massachusetts  and 
South  Carolina;  they  stood  by  one  another  nobly  in  the 
darkest  days  of  peril  and  adversity ;  may  long  years  of  mutual 
prosperity  find  them  undivided."  l  Their  mutual  prosperity 
was  the  prosperity  of  slave-owners  and  slave-traders,  of 
planters  who  grew  cotton  by  slave-labour,  and  of  merchants 
who  dealt  in  it,  and  manufacturers  who  spun  it  and  wove  it. 
This  prosperity  was  threatened  by  a  few  "  fanatical  and  factious 
Abolitionists,"  as  Daniel  Webster  called  them;2  threatened 
far  more  by  the  still  small  voice  of  conscience,  which,  under 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  683.  2  Life  of  Daniel  Webster,  II.  516. 


38  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

the  upbraidings  of  these  men,  was  beginning  to  make  itself 
heard  in  ten  thousand  bosoms.  To  silence  this  voice  cant 
was  called  in  at  the  Banquet,  as,  in  like  circumstances,  it  is 
called  in  at  all  times  and  in  all  places.  After  this  toast  to  the 
maintenance  of  Southern  slavery,  its  maintenance  by  "  the 
grand  old  Bay  State,"  had  been  drunk,  these  Harvard  men 
next  drank  to  "  civil  and  religious  liberty  here  and  every- 
where." "  How  is  it,"  old  Samuel  Johnson  roughly  asked, 
"  How  is  it  that  we  hear  the  loudest  yelps  for  liberty  among 
the  drivers  of  negroes?  "  Even  Lowell,  even  the  author  of  the 
Biglow  Papers,  had  caught  this  strong,  this  rank  contagion  of 
the  gown.  Two  years  after  this  celebration  it  fell  to  his  lot  to 
write  the  poem  for  class  day.  "  I  made  fun  of  the  Abolition- 
ists in  my  Class  Poem,"  so  he  wrote  nearly  fifty  years  later.1 
Nine  months  before  this  Harvard  undergraduate,  in  the 
presence  of  the  President,  the  professors,  the  students  and 
their  friends,  made  fun  of  these  men,  one  of  them,  Elijah 
Lovejoy,  a  minister  of  religion,  had  been  murdered  by  a  cruel 
mob  of  citizens  —  all  friends,  no  doubt,  of  civil  and  religious 
liberty,  there  and  everywhere  —  murdered  because,  in  defiance 
of  mob-law,  he  advocated  in  a  small  newspaper  the  freedom  of 
the  slave.  Four  months  before  this  Harvard  undergraduate 
made  fun  of  these  men,  a  new  Hall  built  by  the  Abolitionists 
in  the  City  of  Brotherly  Love,  "  dedicated  to  Free  Discus- 
sion, Virtue,  Liberty,  and  Independence,"  had  been  burnt  to 
the  ground  by  another  mob.  Three  months  before  this  Har- 
vard undergraduate  made  fun  of  these  men,  in  the  city  of 
Boston  hard  by,  another  anti-slavery  building  would  have  been 
wrecked  by  a  third  mob,  had  it  not  been  for  the  Mayor,  who 
for  once  —  a  rare  example  in  those  bad  days  —  was  ready  by 

1  Letters  ofj.  R.  Lowell,  II.  338. 


II.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  39 

military  force  to  protect  peaceful  citizens  meeting  in  lawful 
assembly.1  "  They  make  a  game  of  my  calamities,"  some 
deeply  wronged  Abolitionist  might  have  exclaimed,  had  any 
one  of  them  been  present  on  this  Class  Day.  Lowell's  noble 
nature  was  soon  to  shake  itself  free  from  "  Harvard  indiffer- 
ence." Before  the  year  came  to  a  close  he  wrote  :  "  The 
Abolitionists  are  the  only  ones  with  whom  I  sympathize  of  the 
present  extant  parties."  Eight  years  later  he  described  these 
same  Abolitionists  as  "  a  body  of  heroic  men  and  women, 
whom  not  to  love  and  admire  would  prove  me  unworthy  of 
either  of  those  sentiments,  and  whose  superiors  in  all  that  con- 
stitutes true  manhood  and  womanhood  I  believe  never  ex- 
isted."2 

It  was  not  in  undergraduate  days  at  Harvard  that  in  Wendell 
Phillips  was  first  stirred  that  passionate  eloquence  which  did 
so  much  to  rouse  the  land  to  a  sense  of  its  guilt.  He  had 
passed  through  the  College  and  the  Law  School,  and  was  still 
indifferent  to  the  good  cause.3  It  was  perhaps  indignation  at 
what  his  Alma  Mater  had  not  done  for  him  that  moved  him  to 
exclaim,  after  the  long  struggle  which  ended  in  Lincoln's  first 
election  :  "  The  agitation  was  a  yeomanly  service  to  liberty. 
It  educated  the  people.  One  such  canvass  makes  amends  for 
the  cowardice  of  our  scholars,  and  consoles  us  under  the  inflic- 
tion of  Harvard  College."  4  In  1848  Sumner  was  passing  from 
town  to  town  in  Massachusetts,  speaking  in  favour  of  the  Free- 
Soil  Party.  Nowhere  but  in  Cambridge  was  the  meeting  dis- 
turbed. There  the  students  "  interrupted  him  with  hisses  and 

1  Life  of  W,  L.  Garrison,  II.  184,  213,  218. 

2  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  I.  37,  123. 

3  Life  of  Charles  Sumner,  III.  69. 

4  Wendell  Phillips's  Speeches,  etc.,  ed.  1863,  p.  306. 


40  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

coarse  exclamations.  He  singled  out  the  leader  of  the  distur- 
bance and  said,  '  The  young  man  who  hisses  will  regret  it  ere 
his  hairs  turn  gray.'  "  Perhaps  he  recalled  it  with  deep  sorrow 
on  some  lonely  day's  march  with  the  Northern  army,  or  in  all 
the  misery  of  a  Southern  prison.  Longfellow  was  one  of  the 
audience.  In  his  journal  he  recorded  : *  "  Sumner  spoke  admi- 
rably well.  But  the  shouts  and  the  hisses  and  the  vulgar  inter- 
ruptions grated  on  my  ears.  I  was  glad  to  get  away." 2  Fif- 
teen months  after  Sumner  was  hissed  in  this  New  England 
University  another  New  Englander,  Daniel  Webster,  made  that 
infamous  speech  of  March  7,  1850,  which  forever  covered  with 
shame  the  name  of  the  greatest  American  orator.  "  He  is," 
wrote  Lowell,  "  the  most  meanly  and  foolishly  treacherous  man 
I  ever  heard  of."  8  In  the  idle  hope  of  saving  the  Union  and 
making  himself  President,  the  old  man  was  ready  in  almost 
everything  to  yield  to  the  Slave  States.  Slavery  was  to  be 
extended  and  its  foundations  were  to  be  laid  more  firmer 
than  ever.  The  cowardice  of  scholars  was  once  more  seen. 
He  was  supported  by  Ticknor,  Everett,  Sparks,  Felton, 
Motley,  and  Parkman.  Even  Dana,  who  at  the  risk  of  his 
life  defended  a  runaway  slave  in  the  Boston  Law  Courts,  was 
ready  to  grant  the  South  a  Fugitive  Slave  Law  —  "a  bona 
fide  one,  but  one  consistent  with  laws,  decency,  safety  to  the 
free,  and  the  self-respect  of  the  North."  4  Among  Harvard 
men  of  letters  Emerson,  Sumner,  and  Lowell  stood  together, 
and  I  fear  alone,  on  the  right  side.  The  Professors  in  the  Law 
School  read  lectures  in  defence  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law. 

lLiff  of  Charles  Sumner,  III.  173. 

*Life  of  H.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  127. 

«  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  I.  208. 

4  Life  of  Charles  Sumner,  III.  205,  208,  n.  4 ;  Life  of  R.  H.  Dana,  1. 126. 


ii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  41 

The  students  who  heard  them,  untouched  by  the  generous 
feelings  of  youth,  were  no  better  than  their  teachers.  More 
than  a  hundred  attended  the  classes.  Of  these  only  six  were 
on  the  side  of  freedom  ;  "  the  rest  were  nearly  all  bitter  against 
the  Free-Soil  Party."1  On  May  14,  1851,  Longfellow  recorded 
in  his  Journal ':  "  Went  to  hear  Emerson  on  the  Fugitive  Slave 
Law  at  the  Cambridge  City  Hall.  ...  It  is  rather  painful  to 
see  Emerson  in  the  arena  of  politics  hissed  and  hooted  at  by 
young  law  students."2  After  the  ruffian  Brooks's  cruel  assault 
on  Sumner  in  the  Senate,  when  all  that  was  not  base  in  America 
was  fired  with  indignation,  it  was  Amherst  College  that  at  once 
conferred  an  honorary  degree  on  the  much-suffering  man.  His 
own  Alma  Mater  let  three  years  pass  by  before  she  honoured 
him.  No  degree  was  ever  conferred  on  William  Lloyd  Garri- 
son either  at  Harvard  or  anywhere  else.3  Universities,  with 
their  strong  spirit  of  conservatism,  are  always  slow  to  honour 
the  men  who  raise  the  unwilling  world  to  a  higher  level  of 
morality.  If  anything  could  wash  away  this  stain  from  Harvard, 
it  was  the  blood  of  her  sons  so  freely  shed  on  many  a  battle- 
field of  the  great  war.  But  in  spite  of  their  generous  devotion 
the  stain  remains.  In  the  long  struggle  for  freedom  it  was  not 
till  it  entered  upon  its  last  and  greatest  act  that  the  oldest  and 
the  first  of  American  universities  was  found  in  the  van. 

1  Life  of  Charles  Sumncr,  III.  207,  246,  n.  2. 
^Life  of  H.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  194. 

8  In  1865  he  was  made  an  honorary  member  of  the  Harvard  Phi 
Beta  Kappa. 


CHAPTER   III. 

Religious  Liberty.  — The  Divinity  School.— The  College  Chapel.— The 
Dudleian  Lectures. — The  English  Liturgy. 

IF,  to  "civil  liberty,  Harvard  at  one  time  showed  herself  in- 
different, in  religious  liberty  she  has  taken  the  lead  of  all 
the  older  universities  of  the  English-speaking  race.  Happily, 
even  in  her  first  charter,  she  was  free  from  the  predominance 
of  any  single  church.  Had  the  College  been  founded  in  Rhode 
Island,  where  Roger  Williams  and  his  followers  gave  the  world 
the  first  example  of  a  government  founded  on  the  principles 
of  complete  religious  liberty,  such  freedom  would  not  have 
been  astonishing.  In  Plymouth,  from  the  Pilgrim  Fathers, 
the  Separatists  of  England,  the  founders  of  the  Independent 
Churches,  some  measure  of  tolerance  might  have  been  looked 
for.  But  in  Boston,  among  the  stern  Puritans,  where  State 
and  Church  were  one,  where  none  but  members  of  the  Church 
were  freemen  of  the  State,  who  would  not  have  expected  to 
find  President,  Fellows,  and  students  all  bound  fast  by  a  rigid 
test?  This  freedom,  it  has  been  conjectured,  was  due 
rather  to  a  careless  feeling  of  security  than  to  intention. 
The  constitution  of  the  Commonwealth  itself  might  be  trusted 
"to  bind  their  souls  with  secular  chains."  If  such  was  the 
security  of  the  founders  of  Harvard  College,  they  forgot  that 
the  charter  of  a  colony  was  liable  to  change.  Theirs  was 
annulled  by  the  tyranny  of  Charles  II.  in  those  evil  days 

42 


CHAP.  in.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  43 

towards  the  end  of  his  reign,  when  Jeffreys,  in  his  progress 
through  English  towns,  was  "  making  all  the  charters,  like  the 
walls  of  Jericho,  fall  down  before  him."  In  the  new  charter, 
granted  in  1692  by  William  and  Mary,  property,  not  church- 
membership,  was  made  the  qualification  for  a  vote.1  The 
door,  if  not  thrown  open  for  the  entrance  of  free  thought,  was, 
at  all  events,  unbarred.  For  many  a  long  day  there  was  to 
be  little  of  freedom  as  it  was  understood  by  Roger  Williams 
of  the  seventeenth  century,  and  by  us  of  the  latter  years  of 
the  nineteenth.  Nevertheless,  so  great  was  the  alarm  given 
to  the  orthodox  that  Yale  College  was  founded  in  the  hope 
that  from  it  might  flow  a  never-failing  spring  of  untainted 
Calvinism.2  From  the  servitude  that  was  then  imposed,  that 
university  has  no  more  shaken  herself  wholly  free  than  has 
Oxford  from  the  servitude  of  Anglicanism.  Both  have  done 
much,  but  both  have  still  much  to  do.  Even  at  the  present 
day,  Harvard  is  regarded  by  Yale  as  the  London  University 
used  to  be  regarded  by  the  orthodox  of  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge. It  is  "the  Godless  university."  Harvard  retorts  on 
Yale  that  it  is  the  home  of  superstition  and  Phariseeism.  A 
writer  in  the  Harvard  Crimson 3  says :  "  Yale  friends  naturally 
accuse  Harvard  students  of  being  irreligious;  while  Harvard 
advocates  call  the  Yale  religious  life  hypocrisy." 

From  the  time  when  the  new  charter  was  granted  to  the 
Colony,  Harvard,  in  matters  of  theology,  has  kept  pace  with 
the  people,  its  thoughts  widening  as  their  thoughts  widened. 
The  President  and  Fellows  would  often,  indeed,  have  moved 
faster,  but  they  were  restrained  by  the  Board  of  Overseers, 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  55;    The  Beginning  of  New  England,  by  John 
Fiske,  1893,  PP-  264»  275. 

2  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  197. 


44  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

on  which  the  Congregational  ministers  of  Cambridge  and  the 
five  nearest  towns  sat  by  right.  In  1820,  when  the  constitu- 
tion of  Massachusetts  was  revised,  even  the  overseers  were 
ahead  of  the  people  in  liberal  thought.  They  proposed  to 
admit  ministers  of  all  denominations  of  Christians  to  these 
clerical  seats,  but  in  a  popular  vote  this  proposition  was  re- 
jected.1 Fourteen  years  later,  in  1834,  an  act  was  passed  by 
the  Legislature  of  Massachusetts,  which  enabled  the  two  gov- 
erning bodies  of  the  University  to  effect  this  reform.  One  or 
other  of  these  bodies  was  now  behind  the  people,  perhaps 
both;  for  it  was  not  till  1843  that  they  availed  themselves  of 
their  powers.2  By  the  Act  of  1851,  all  clerical  restrictions 
were  removed,  not  a  single  seat  on  the  Board  being  any  longer 
confined  to  the  ministry.8 

As  in  Massachusetts,  Calvinism  had  gradually  softened  into 
Unitarianism,  so  Harvard  had  gradually  become,  if  not  a 
Unitarian  College,  a  College  of  Unitarians.  Judge  Story's' 
father,  who  was  born  in  1743,  was  not  sent  to  Harvard,  writes 
his  son,  "  lest  he  should  there  imbibe  those  heretical  tenets, 
which,  in  the  form  of  Arminianism,  were  then  supposed  to 
haunt  those  venerable  shades."  The  judge,  who  went  to  the 
College,  shook  himself  free  from  his  Calvinism,  and  was  sev- 
eral times  President  of  the  American  Unitarian  Association.4 
It  was  by  Unitarians  that  the  Divinity  School  was  founded 
in  1816.  In  its  constitution,  "the  following  article  was  a 
fundamental  one :  '  It  being  understood  that  every  encourage- 
ment be  given  to  the  serious,  impartial,  and  unbiassed  inves- 
tigation of  Christian  truth,  and  that  no  assent  to  the  peculiari- 
ties of  any  denomination  of  Christians  be  required  either  of 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  332.  2  Harvard  Catalogue,  p.  24. 

8  Ib.  *  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  I.  2,  57. 


III.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  45 

the  students,  or  professors,  or  instructors. '  " l  The  School  was, 
however,  "  regarded  as  distinctively  Unitarian,  and  so  caused 
uneasiness  to  the  government  of  the  University  on  account  of 
its  denominational  position.  As  the  College  began  to  take 
its  position  as  an  unsectarian  institution,  it  seemed  a  hin- 
drance in  its  course  that  a  Unitarian  Divinity  School  should 
be  attached  to  it.  It  was  felt  that,  in  the  public  estimate, 
the  School  would  give  a  denominational  aspect  to  the  whole 
University."2  An  attempt  was  accordingly  made  to  separate 
it  from  the  College.  "An  enabling  act  was  passed  by  the 
Legislature  in  1858,  but  the  project  of  separation  was  never 
carried  further.  It  was  conceded  that  it  would  be  false  to  all 
our  traditions,  if,  in  a  College  named  for 8  a  Puritan  minister, 
fostered  by  a  Puritan  clergy,  and  bearing  on  its  corporate  seal 
the  motto  Christo  et  Ecclesicz,  religion  should  be  the  only 
subject  deliberately  excluded."4  In  1878  the  movement  set 
the  other  way,  and  a  large  sum  of  money  was  raised  for  the 
further  endowment  of  the  School.  "The  Harvard  Divinity 
School,"  said  Professor  Eliot  on  this  occasion,  "is  not  dis- 
tinctively Unitarian  either  by  its  constitution  or  by  the  inten- 
tion of  its  founders.  The  government  of  the  University  can- 
not undertake  to  appoint  none  but  Unitarian  teachers,  or  to 
grant  any  peculiar  favours  to  Unitarian  students."  So  far 
was  it  from  doing  so,  that  in  1887,  of  the  six  professors  in 
the  theological  Faculty,  two  were  Baptists  and  one  an  Ortho- 
dox Congregational ist,  while  of  the  eleven  members  compos- 
ing the  visiting  committee,  not  half  were  Unitarians.5  Never- 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  546. 

2  Professor  C.  C.  Everett  quoted  in  Higher  Education  in  Massachusetts, 
by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  144. 

8  An  American  says  "  named  for  "  where  we  say  "  named  after" 
^Higher  Education,  etc,,  p.  141.  6  Ib.  p.  144. 


46  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

theless,  in  spite  of  this  mixture  of  creeds,  in  spite  of  the  fact 
that  three  of  the  professors  orthodoxly,  if  not  practically, 
believed  that  the  other  three  were  doomed  to  "  the  everlasting 
bonfire,"  the  President  could  say  in  his  Annual  Report :  "  There 
is  no  more  harmonious  Faculty  in  the  University,  and  none 
more  completely  devoted  to  the  unbiassed  search  for  truth."  l 
Verily,  in  Cambridge,  Massachusetts,  the  days  seem  already 
to  have  come  when  "  the  wolf  shall  dwell  with  the  lamb,  and 
the  leopard  shall  lie  down  with  the  kid." 

However  much  the  College  was  once  given  over  to  Unitari- 
anism,  the  President  and  Fellows  fifty-six  years  ago  showed 
that  they  entertained  something  of  a  superstitious  feeling  in 
the  use  of  their  Chapel.  Longfellow,  one  of  the  most  reli- 
gious of  men,  writing  to  his  father  about  his  work  at  Harvard 
as  a  professor,  said :  "  I  am  now  upon  Dante  —  unwritten  lec- 
tures; but  I  have  petitioned  the  Corporation  for  the  use  of 
the  Chapel  next  summer  for  a  course  of  written  public  lectures* 
By  public,  I  mean  free  to  any  and  every  one  who  chooses  to 
attend,  whether  in  college  or  out  of  college."  He  no  doubt 
asked  for  the  Chapel  as  the  only  available  place.  Six  weeks 
later  he  recorded  in  his  Journal ':  "The  President  told  me  that 
the  Corporation  would  not  allow  me  the  use  of  the  Chapel  for 
public  lectures  in  the  summer.  They  do  not  approve  my 
plan.  So  it  ends."2 

Professor  Goodwin,  looking  forward  to  the  position  that 
Harvard  is  likely  to  hold  before  many  years  have  gone  by, 
says :  "  She  will  be  fully  equipped  for  the  best  work  in  every  de- 
partment, in  Theology,  in  Law,  in  Medicine,  and  in  the  Arts 
and  Sciences.  I  think  we  may  be  sure  that  she  will  always 

1  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  145. 

*Life  ofH.  W.  Longfellow,  1886,  I.  275,  282. 


in.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  47 

represent  the  foremost  progress  of  science,  and  will  always 
welcome  the  boldest  speculation  on  every  subject.  No  party 
nor  sect  will  control  her  teaching,  to  cause  either  the  pro- 
mulgation of  unscientific  dogmas  or  the  suppression  of  scien- 
tific truth.  I  need  hardly  say  that  no  exception  will  be  made 
in  this  respect  for  philosophy,  political  science,  or  even  theol- 
ogy. Public  opinion  is  fast  settling  this  matter  beyond  the 
reach  of  controversy.  Parties  and  sects  will,  of  course,  preach 
their  own  doctrines  and  creeds  then  in  their  own  schools,  as 
they  do  now;  but  the  true  university  can  recognize  only  the 
free  and  unbiassed  search  for  truth  for  the  truth's  sake.  Hap- 
pily we  have  no  antiquated  statutes  or  traditions  to  sweep 
away  to  prepare  us  for  the  coming  age.  Our  ancient  motto 
Veritas  stands  always  over  our  own  gates,  and  we  interpret  it 
by  the  principle  of  freedom.  'Prove  all  things;  hold  fast  to 
that  which  is  good.'  nl  The  Professor  seems  somewhat  con- 
veniently to  forget  the  other  ancient  motto,  Christo  et  Ecclesice. 
In  the  Sunday  and  week-day  services  of  the  College  Chapel 
the  same  impartiality  is  shown  as  in  the  Divinity  School.  Five 
preachers  of  eminence,  from  among  the  ministers  of  all  de- 
nominations, are  chosen  every  year  "  to  arrange  and  conduct 
the  religious  services  of  the  University.  Each  conducts  daily 
morning  prayers  for  about  three  weeks  in  the  first  half-year 
and  about  three  weeks  in  the  second  half-year,  and  each 
preaches  on  four  Sunday  evenings."2  Dr.  Herford,  an  Eng- 
lish Unitarian  divine,  was  for  some  years  one  of  the  five. 
The  preachers  for  the  present  year  are  a  bishop  of  the  Metho- 
dist Episcopal  Church,  a  Congregationalist,  two  Episcopa- 
lians, and  a  Unitarian. 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  40. 

2  Catalogue \  p.  478. 


48  HARVARD   COLLEGE,  CHAP. 

Among  those  of  past  years  was  Bishop  Phillips  Brooks, 
whose  early  death  I  found  everywhere  mourned  in  Massachu- 
setts, and  in  whose  memory  a  meeting  was  last  year  held  in 
the  Chapter  House  of  Westminster  Abbey.  On  the  Sunday 
evenings  when  none  of  the  five  officiates,  the  pulpit  is  filled 
by  a  Select  Preacher,  to  use  the  Oxford  designation.  Among 
these,  in  1892,  were  Bishop  Vincent,  the  Right  Rev.  H.  C. 
Potter,  and  Professor  Drummond  of  Glasgow.  In  the  spring 
of  the  present  year,  a  Roman  Catholic  priest  —  a  former  stu- 
dent of  Harvard  —  officiated  for  the  first  time.  The  prayers 
which  he  recited  were  collects  translated  from  the  Latin,  and 
the  lesson  which  he  read  was,  as  he  remarked,  from  the  mass 
for  the  day.  His  sermon  was  a  philosophical  argument  for 
faith  in  the  Supernatural.  Of  the  Supernatural  he  gave  no 
definition.  A  fortnight  later,  the  pulpit  was  filled  by  Pro- 
fessor Felix  Adler,  the  founder  of  the  Ethical  Societies  —  a 
teacher  who  would  hardly  call  himself  a  theist.  For  those 
students  who  care  to  attend  the  services  of  the  sects  to  which 
they  belong,  seats  are  provided  in  the  Cambridge  churches, 
at  the  expense  of  the  College. 

Of  the  great  liberality  of  the  University  in  religious  matters 
the  following  curious  instance  was  given  me.  A  son  of  Joseph 
Dudley,  who  was  Governor  of  the  Colony  in  the  first  years  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  founded  a  lectureship  in  divinity. 
Four  lectures  were  to  be  delivered  every  year  on  certain  sub- 
jects strictly  laid  down  in  the  trust-deed,  one  being,  "the 
idolatry,  errors,  and  superstitions  of  the  Romish  Church." 
As  the  value  of  money  fell,  the  lecturer's  payment  became  so 
small  that  for  many  years  the  course  was  discontinued  while 
the  fund  accumulated.  The  College  at  one  time  thought  of 
getting  an  act  passed  by  which  it  should  be  applied  to  some 


in.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  49 

other  purpose.  They  were  deterred  by  the  reflection  that 
such  a  measure  might  be  a  check  to  endowments  and  bequests 
in  a  country  where  the  general  sentiment  as  to  the  sanctity  of 
the  wishes  of  founders  and  testators  is  usually  strong.  The 
trustees,  it  was  found,  were  willing  to  interpret  the  provisions 
of  the  trust  somewhat  laxly.  By  spreading  the  course  of  four 
lectures  over  as  many  years,  they  were  able  to  offer  an  annual 
payment  sufficient  to  secure  on  each  occasion  a  preacher  who 
would  not  disgrace  the  University.  Their  first  appointment 
was  the  Professor  of  Ecclesiastical  History,  who,  to  comply 
with  the  testator's  direction,  took  for  his  subject  the  errors  of 
Romanism,  treating  them  historically.  The  third  lecture, 
also  in  compliance  with  the  terms  of  the  foundation,  was  "  for 
the  confirmation,  illustration,  and  improvement  of  the  great 
articles  of  the  Christian  religion,  properly  so  called."  It 
was  delivered  by  the  Right  Rev.  Bishop  John  J.  Keane,  rector 
of  the  Roman  Catholic  University  of  America.1 

Till  recent  years  the  attendance  at  the  College  Chapel  was 
compulsory.  Under  this  system,  there  was  even  greater  irre- 
verence than  was  to  be  seen  in  an  Oxford  Chapel  in  the  days 
when  we  had  to  "keep"  so  many  chapels  a  week,  and  when 
"  chapelling "  was  used  as  a  form  of  punishment.  In  my 
College,  and  I  believe  in  most  others,  an  undergraduate  was 
expected  to  attend  chapel  eight  times  a  week  — "  to  keep 
eight  chapels,"  as  we  called  it.  If  in  his  Freshman's  year  he 
was  regular,  he  might  in  his  later  terms  become  laxer  in  his 
attendance,  especially  if  his  general  conduct  was  good.  The 
penalty  for  too  great  laxness  was  "chapelling."  He  who 
was  "chapelled"  had  to  attend  morning  and  evening  service 
during  a  period  fixed  by  the  Dean.  These  services  were  the 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  139;    Catalogue,  1891-92,  p.  no. 
E 


50  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

full  services  of  the  Church;  prayers  for  the  Queen,  Royal 
Family,  and  High  Court  of  Parliament  included.  At  Harvard 
last  century,  attendance  and  good  behaviour  were  enforced  by 
the  following  fines :  — 

Absence  from  prayers two  pence 

Tardiness  at  prayers one  penny 

Absence  from  public  worship nine  pence 

Tardiness  at  public  worship three  pence 

Ill-behaviour  at  public  worship not  exceeding  nine  pence 

Neglect  to  repeat  the  sermon nine  pence l 

In  my  time,  at  Oriel  College,  then  under  the  rule  of  that 
model  of  formality  and  preciseness,  Provost  Hawkins,  the 
undergraduates,  as  I  was  informed  by  one  of  the  scholars, 
were  each  required  to  "repeat"  the  University  sermon,  or  at 
all  events  to  send  in  to  their  tutor  a  report  of  it.  Many  of 
them  used  to  meet  after  dinner  on  the  Sunday  evening,  and 
there,  over  their  cigars  and  whisky  and  water,  write  out  the 
sermon  by  the  aid  of  one  or  two  who  had  been  present  at 
St.  Mary's.  Perhaps  some  of  the  "repeating"  at  Harvard 
was  done  on  the  same  system. 

Stories  are  told  of  the  pranks  played  of  old  by  the  students. 
Sometimes  in  the  candles  which  lighted  the  pulpit,  holes  were 
bored  and  gunpowder  was  inserted  so  as  to  cause  an  explosion 
during  the  sermon.  One  day  a  cracker  was  fastened  to  the 
Bible.  The  Bible  itself  was  thrice  stolen.  Once  it  was 
sent,  stripped  of  its  binding,  to  the  librarian  of  Yale  College, 
with  a  dog- Latin  inscription  on  the  fly-leaf,  in  which  it  was 
stated:  "Coveres  servamus  in  usum  chessboardi  pro  Helter 
Skelter  Club."  The  tongue  of  the  Chapel  bell  was  removed; 
"the  seats  allotted  to  the  Freshmen  were  painted  green; 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  499. 


Hi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  51 

stripes  like  those  on  a  barber's  pole  were  painted  on  the 
porch  of  the  Chapel."  In  fact,  the  Harvard  boys  behaved 
just  as  ill  as  Christ  Church  men.  The  irreverence  was  no 
doubt  mainly  due  to  the  length  and  frequency  of  the  services. 
As  if  they  were  not  trying  enough  in  themselves,  theological 
dissertations  by  divinity  students  were  frequently  read  aloud 
after  evening  prayers.  In  a  single  year  the  undergraduates 
suffered  under  thirty-two  such  inflictions.1  It  sometimes 
happened  that  the  minister  who  conducted  the  service  by  his 
eccentricity  provoked  mirth.  I  was  told  of  one  old  President 
who,  when  his  mind  was  failing,  one  morning  astonished  the 
congregation  by  praying  that  "their  intemperance  might  be 
turned  into  temperance,  and  their  industry  into  dustry." 
In  Yale  far  greater  decorum  seems  to  have  been  maintained. 
Professor  Thacher,  in  his  Life  of  Benjamin  Silliman,  writing 
of  the  years  1831  to  1835,  tells  how  "the  students,  at  the  close 
of  the  services  in  the  Chapel,  always  waited  respectfully  for 
the  Professors  to  pass  between  their  ranks  and  leave  the  house 
first.  Professor  Silliman  took  the  lead,  receiving  the  bows 
of  the  Seniors  and  Freshmen  successively  with  all  the  stateli- 
ness  and  easy  grace  of  a  man  born  to  head  a  procession."  2 

A  happy  chance,  wisely  turned  to  account,  gave  the  first 
blow  in  Harvard  to  compulsory  attendance  at  religious  ser- 
vices. In  1872-73,  the  Chapel  was  closed  for  alterations, 
and  morning  prayer  was  discontinued  for  some  months. 
President  Eliot  in  his  report  for  that  year  said :  — 

"  The  Faculty  thus  tried,  quite  involuntarily,  an  interesting  experiment 
in  College  discipline.  It  has  been  a  common  opinion  that  morning  prayers 
were  not  only  right  and  helpful  in  themselves,  but  also  necessary  to  College 

1  An  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  by  W.  R.  Thayer,  p.  45. 

2  Vol.  II.  p.  341. 


52  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

discipline,  partly  as  a  morning  roll-call  and  partly  as  a  means  of  enforcing 
continuous  residence.  It  was  therefore  interesting  to  observe  that  the 
omission  of  morning  prayers  for  nearly  five  months,  at  the  time  of  year 
when  the  days  are  shortest  and  coldest,  had  no  ill  effects  whatever  on  Col- 
lege order  or  discipline.  There  was  no  increased  irregularity  of  attendance 
at  morning  exercises,  no  unusual  number  of  absences,  and,  in  fact,  no  visi- 
ble effect  upon  the  other  exercises  of  the  College,  or  upon  the  quiet  and 
order  of  the  place.  The  Professors  and  other  teachers  living  beyond  the 
sound  of  the  prayer-bell  would  not  have  known  from  any  effect  produced 
upon  their  work  with  the  students  that  morning  prayers  had  been  inter- 
mitted." i 

The  President  and  Fellows,  using  their  common  sense, 
passed  a  vote  that  attendance  at  Chapel  should  henceforth  be 
voluntary.  The  overseers,  not  using  theirs,  exercised  their 
right  of  veto.  Some  relaxation  was  however  made ;  what  is 
called  the  thin  edge  of  the  wedge  by  all  enemies  of  liberty 
and  progress  was  inserted,  and,  at  last,  in  1886,  every  student 
was  left  free  to  worship  God  when  and  where  he  pleased,  or 
not  to  worship  him  at  all.  The  result  has  been  all  that  might 
have  reasonably  been  expected,  and  all  that  could  have  been 
desired.  "The  average  attendance  at  morning  prayers  is 
upwards  of  two  hundred.  The  service  is  a  reverent  and  de- 
lightful one."  "  Students  no  longer  come  rushing  into  Chapel 
attired  only  in  a  mackintosh  and  rubber  boots  [goloshes],  nor 
do  they  finish  their  breakfast  in  the  pews  instead  of  reading 
the  responses."2  The  service  begins  with  the  reading  of  a 
psalm  by  the  minister  and  students,  in  alternate  verses,  not 
unhappily  from  the  beautiful  version  in  our  Book  of  Common 
Prayer,  and  is  followed  by  an  anthem  sung  by  the  choir. 
"  Sometimes  a  solo  or  duet  is  sung  instead.  After  this  comes 
the  reading  of  the  Bible,  with  comments  by  the  preacher  and  a 

1  An  Historical  Sketch,  etc. ,  p.  46. 

2  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.   148 ;    Harvard's  Better  Self,  by  W.  R. 
Bigelow,  p.  4. 


ill.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  53 

prayer.  It  is  the  preacher's  share  in  the  exercises  that  is  most 
unique  and  most  attractive.  To  listen  every  morning  for  two 
weeks  to  the  eloquent  words  of  Dr.  Phillips  Brooks,  full  of  the 
( beauty  of  holiness  ' ;  for  another  two  weeks  to  search  out  the 
distinctive  features  of  the  Old  Testament  books,  as  they  are 
explained  by  Dr.  Lyman  Abbott;  to  hear  a  glowing  eulogy  of 
Moses  from  the  lips  of  Dr.  Edward  Everett  Hale,  and  to  fol- 
low him  as  he  points  out  the  greatness  of  the  Bible  heroes 
from  morning  to  morning;  —  these  are  high  privileges,  and 
they  are  attractions."  1 

In  Harvard  there  is  that  ignorant  dread  of  sameness  in 
the  services  of  religion  which  in  England,  in  recent  years, 
has  led  to  the  multiplication  of  hymns  and  hymn-books.  The 
great  masters  of  our  language  who  gave  us  the  Book  of  Com- 
mon Prayer  had  a  better  understanding  of  the  human  heart. 
They  had  no  fear  lest  perfect  compositions,  the  ninety- 
fifth  psalm,  the  Te  Deum,  the  four  daily  collects  should 
pall  by  repetition.  Cranmer,  whose  ear  for  the  melody  of 
prose  has  surely  never  been  surpassed,  did  not  vary  the 
close  of  matins  and  vespers.  Who  could  grow  weary  of 
that  exquisite  cadence  in  which  the  most  beautiful  of  all 
liturgies  dies,  as  it  were,  away  T—  "  granting  us  in  this  world 
knowledge  of  Thy  truth,  and  in  the  world  to  come  life  ever- 
lasting." However  much  we  suffered  in  our  childhood  from 
the  services  piled  one  on  the  other  —  Ossa  on  Pelion  and 
Pelion  on  leafy  Olympus  —  and  from  the  long  and  tedious 
sermons,  who  ever  grew  weary  of  Bishop  Ken's  morning  hymn, 
with  which,  in  so  many  churches  in  the  old  days,  each  Sun- 
day's service  always  began,  and  of  his  evening  hymn  which 
brought  the  afternoon  service  to  a  close  ?  On  a  winter  day, 

1  Harvard's  Better  Self,  by  W.  R.  Bigelow,  p.  2. 


54  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  in. 

when  the  darkness  which  had  fallen  on  the  congregation 
seemed  only  the  deeper  and  the  more  solemn  from  the  two 
candles  which  lighted  the  preacher  in  the  pulpit,  how  much 
was  the  heart  touched  by  the  words  so  beautiful  in  their  sim- 
plicity, which  Sunday  after  Sunday,  and  year  after  year,  had 
been  sung  by  eight  generations  of  men !  In  all  religious  ser- 
vices, everything  that  is  new  is  out  of  place.  It  is  only  the  old 
familiar  words,  the  words  which  we  first  heard  we  know  not 
when,  that  deeply  move  us.  We  no  more  wish  for  fresh  forms 
of  prayer  than  at  the  close  of  each  winter  we  wish  for  a  fresh 
form  of  spring.  To  hear  over  and  over  again  a  beautiful 
liturgy  and  the  finest  passages  in  the  glorious  English  of  our 
Bible,  is  in  itself  the  best  of  all  trainings  in  the  use  of  our 
noble  language.  At  no  time  in  our  history  has  there  been 
greater  need  of  that  constant  repetition,  that  replication  of 
the  noblest  sounds,  which  imperceptibly  but  surely  trains  the 
ear  to  melody.  At  no  time  has  there  been  so  much  varied 
reading,  reading  far  too  often  of  careless,  extravagant, 
affected,  and  mongrel  English.  When  books  were  rare,  and 
newspapers  rarer  still,  a  few  great  authors  were  read  again  and 
again.  On  great  writers  our  fathers'  style  became  modelled. 
"  Glowing  eulogies  of  Moses  "  can  surely  be  left  to  the  Rev. 
Dr.  Harwoods  of  the  world,  the  man  who  in  his  Liberal  Trans- 
lation of  the  New  Testament,  by  expanding  Jesus  wept  into 
Jesus,  the  Saviour  of  the  world,  burst  into  a  flood  of  tears, 
provoked  Johnson's  indignant  outcry  of  Puppy  !  Outside  of 
the  universities  there  are  Rev.  Dr.  Harwoods  enough  in  the 
present  day  —  certainly  in  England  and,  I  have  little  doubt, 
in  America.  Moses  needs  no  eulogy  beyond  the  English  ver- 
sion of  his  books.  In  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis,  in  the 
story  of  Joseph,  and  in  the  thunders  of  Sinai,  his  praises  are 
written  for  all  time. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Punishments    and    Fines.  —  "The    Ancient    Customs."  —  Fagging    and 
"  Hazing."  — Tutors  and  Undergraduates.  —  Rebellions. 

IN  Harvard  an  undergraduate  who  has  any  touch  about  him 
of  the  antiquary  or  historian  finds  much  to  interest  him  in 
the  usages  of  the  past.  He  finds  a  minuteness  of  discipline 
which  is  scarcely  excelled  by  that  contained  in  the  book 
which  the  Vice-Chancellor  of  Oxford  handed  to  me  and  to 
each  of  my  companions  when  we  matriculated,  with  the  follow- 
ing address :  Scitote  vos  in  matriculant  hujus  Universitatis 
hodie  relatos  esse  sub  hac  conditione,  nempe  ut  omnia  statuta 
hoc  libro  comprehensa  pro  virili  observetis.  If  we  ever  examined 
these  statutes,  it  was  certainly  not  for  the  sake  of  keeping  them, 
but  of  mocking  them.  At  Harvard,  where  the  age  of  the  stu- 
dents was  younger,  corporal  punishment  was  kept  up  for  nearly 
a  hundred  years  longer  than  in  the  English  universities.  I 
doubt  whether  at  Oxford  any  was  inflicted  later  than  the  reign 
of  Charles  II.  About  1680  "  the  poor  children  "  —  the  servitors 
that  is  to  say,  or  foundationers  of  Queen's  College  —  were  sen- 
tenced to  be  whipped.  It  does  not  seem,  however,  that  the 
punishment  was  actually  executed.1  In  the  New  England 
University  it  was  gradually  discontinued,  and  by  about  the 
middle  of  last  century  came  to  an  end.  Its  place  had  been 
taken  by  an  elaborate  system  of  fines.  In  them  scales,  as  it 

*  Hist.  Comm.  MSS  Fleming  MSS,  pp.  166,  168. 
55 


56  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

were,  are  given  by  which  we  can  ascertain  the  comparative 
weight  of  sins  in  New  England  in  the  first  half  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  Omitting  the  fines  for  regulating  conduct  at  Chapel, 
which  I  have  already  quoted,  and  some  others,  it  stands  as 

follows :  — 

d 

"  Absence  from  Professor's  public  lecture 4 

Profanation  of  Lord's  Day,  not  exceeding 3.0 

Undergraduates  tarrying  out  of  town  without  leave,  not  exceeding  per 

diem 1.3 

Going  out  of  College  without  proper  garb,  not  exceeding 6 

Frequenting  taverns,  not  exceeding 1.6 

Profane  cursing,  not  exceeding 2.6 

Graduates  playing  cards,  not  exceeding 5.0 

Undergraduates  playing  cards,  not  exceeding 2.6 

Selling  and  exchanging  without  leave,  not  exceeding 6 

Lying,  not  exceeding 6 

Drunkenness,  not  exceeding    6 

Going  upon  the  top  of  the  College 6 

Tumultuous  noises 6 

Tumultuous  noises,  second  offence 3.0 

Refusing  to  give  evidence 3.0 

Rudeness  at  meals i.o 

Keeping  guns,  and  going  on  skating i.o 

Fighting,  or  hurting  persons,  not  exceeding 1.6" * 

It  is  interesting  to  see  that  for  a  graduate  to  play  at  cards 
was  three  times  and  a  third  as  wicked  as  for  an  undergraduate 
to  lie,  and  that  to  go  skating  was  two-thirds  as  immoral  as  get- 
ting drunk.  I  was  told  that  thirty  years  or  so  ago  "  tumultuous 
noises  "  were  raised  not  only  in  the  Yard  but  even  in  the  classes, 
while  rough  horse-play  often  went  on.  For  some  while  past 
all  this  has  been  looked  on  as  "  bad  form,"  and  is  no  longer 
practised.  "  Nothing,"  says  a  writer  in  the  Crimson,  "  could 
show  a  greater  contrast  than  the  comparative  stillness  of  the 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  499. 


IV. 


HARVARD   COLLEGE.  57 


Yale  Campus l  and  the  Harvard  Yard.  In  front  of  the  Harvard 
buildings  no  one  yells  '  Fire,'  or  blows  a  horn ;  men  do  not 
shout  for  a  friend  under  his  room.  A  Harvard  man  would  not 
be  able  to  understand  the  Yale  fondness  for  pure  noise." 

The  three  shillings  fine  for  "  refusing  to  give  evidence  "  per- 
haps dates  back  to  the  rule  of  the  second  President,  the  divine 
stubborn  in  the  faith  of  adult  baptism  by  immersion,  who,  when 
consulted  about  the  lawfulness  of  inflicting  torture,  replied  : 
"  But  now  if  ye  question  be  mente  of  inflicting  bodyly  torments 
to  extracte  a  confession  from  a  mallefactor,  I  conceive  yt  in 
maters  of  higest  consequence,  such  as  doe  concerne  ye  saftie 
or  ruine  of  stats  or  countries,  magistrats  may  proceede  so  farr 
in  bodily  torments  as  racks,  hote-irons,  &c.,  to  extracte  a  con- 
ffession,  especially  when  presumptions  are  strounge  ;  but  other- 
wise by  no  means.  God  sometimes  hids  a  sinner  till  his 
wickedness  is  filled  up." 2 

"  The  Ancient  Customs  of  Harvard  College  established  by 
the  Government  of  it  "  bore  hard  on  the  Freshmen,  who  were 
little  better  than  the  fags  of  an  English  Public  School. 

"  No  Freshmen,"  we  read,  "  shall  wear  his  hat  in  the  College 
Yard,  unless  it  rains,  hails,  or  snows,  provided  he  be  on  foot 
and  have  not  both  his  hands  full. 

"  No  Freshman  shall  speak  to  a  Senior  with  his  hat  on. 

"  All  Freshmen  .  .  .  shall  be  obliged  to  go  on  any  errand  for 
any  of  his  Seniors,  graduates  or  undergraduates,  at  any  time, 
except  in  studying  hours,  or  after  nine  o'clock  in  the  evening. 

"  A  Senior  Sophister  has  authority  to  take  a  Freshman  from 

1The  precincts  of  a  university,  known  as  the  Yard  in  Harvard,  are  in 
most  American  universities  called  the  Campus. 

2  Governor  Bradford's  History  of  Plymouth  Plantation  (Mass.  Hist. 
Soc.  4th  S.  III.  396). 


58  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

a  Sophomore,  a  Middle  Bachelor  from  a  Junior  Sophister,  a 
Master  from  a  Senior,  and  any  Governor  of  the  College  from  a 
Master. 

"  When  any  person  knocks  at  a  Freshman's  door  except  in 
studying  time,  he  shall  immediately  open  the  door,  without 
inquiring  who  is  there. 

"  The  Freshmen  shall  furnish  batts,  balls  and  foot-balls  for 
the  use  of  the  students,  to  be  kept  at  the  Buttery. 

"  The  Sophomores  shall  publish  these  customs  to  the  Fresh- 
men in  the  Chapel,  whenever  ordered  by  any  in  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  College,  at  which  time  the  Freshmen  are  required 
to  keep  their  places  in  their  seats,  and  attend  with  decency  to 
the  reading."  l 

The  unfortunate  Freshman  with  a  Senior  Sophister  calling  to 
him  from  one  quarter,  a  Sophomore  from  a  second,  a  Middle 
Bachelor  from  a  third,  a  Junior  Sophister  from  a  fourth,  a  Mas- 
ter from  a  fifth,  a  Governor  of  the  College  from  a  sixth,  must 
have  been  far  more  distracted  even  than  Francis  in  Shake- 
speare's Henry  IV.,  of  whom  the  stage- direction  says  :  "  The 
drawer  stands  amazed,  not  knowing  which  way  to  go." 

Others  beside  the  Freshmen  were  made  to  show  respect  for 
their  superiors  by  going  bareheaded  in  their  presence.  "  No 
undergraduate  shall  wear  his  hat  in  the  College  Yard,  when  any 
of  the  Governors  of  the  College  are  there ;  and  no  Bachelor 
shall  wear  his  hat  when  the  President  is  there." 

A  Fellow  of  St.  John's  College,  describing  Oxford  at  about 
the  same  period,  says  :  "  The  principal  thing  required  is  ex- 
ternal respect  from  the  Juniors,  however  ignorant  or  unworthy 
a  Senior  Fellow  may  be,  yet  the  slightest  disrespect  is  treated 
as  the  greatest  crime  of  which  an  academic  can  be  guilty."  2 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  539.          2  Boswell's  Life  of  Johnson,  III.  13,  n.  3. 


iv.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  59 

For  these  regulations  about  hats  the  republican  spirit  of  Har- 
vard, quickened,  if  not  called  forth  by  the  Revolution,  became 
too  strong.  About  the  beginning  of  the  present  century  formal 
permission  was  given  to  the  students  to  wear  their  hats  in 
the  Yard,  no  matter  who  might  be  present.1  As  regards  the 
custom  of  going  bareheaded,  a  singular  change  has  taken  place 
in  Oxford.  In  my  undergraduate  days  every  one  wore  his  col- 
lege cap  in  the  quadrangle,  even  though  he  had  not  on  his 
gown.  About  twenty  years  ago  men  began  to  go  about  bare- 
headed inside  their  college  gate,  even  though  their  gowns  were 
on  their  shoulders.  Gradually  the  liberties,  if  I  may  use  the  old 
term,  of  each  college  were  curiously  extended.  One  day  I 
noticed  an  undergraduate  in  his  gown  walking  bareheaded  in  the 
Broad  Street.  I  was  told  that,  beyond  all  doubt,  he  was  a  Bal- 
liol  man ;  as  Balliol  men  assume  that  all  the  street  in  front  of 
their  College  belongs  to  Balliol,  in  spite  of  the  impertinence  of 
the  citizens  who  claim  and  maintain  a  right  of  way.  In  like 
manner  a  Queen's  College  man  walks  bareheaded  across  the 
High  Street  to  the  Schools.2 

The  rule  at  Harvard  which  required  a  Freshman  at  once  to 
open  his  door  on  hearing  a  knock  deprived  youth  of  one  of  its 
highest  satisfactions.  How  great  was  our  pride  when,  for  the 
first  time  in  our  lives,  we  felt  that  in  our  case  an  Englishman's 
house  was  his  castle ;  when  we  closed  our  inner  and  our  outer 
door  and  knew  that,  whoever  might  knock,  law  and  custom 
alike  justified  us  in  remaining  silent  and  secluded.3  It  is  with 
regret  I  learn  that  this  good  old  custom  in  some  colleges  has 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  278. 

2  The  building  in  which  the  examinations  are  held. 

3  The  outer  door  is  solidly  made,  and  opening  outward,  and  having  no 
handle,  cannot  be  forced  without  the  greatest  violence.     To  close  it  was, 
and  I  suppose  is  still  called  in  college  slang,  "to  sport  one's  oak." 


60  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

passed  away,  and  that  in  them  no  undergraduate,  of  whatever 
standing  he  may  be,  presumes  to  close  his  outer  door.  Bores 
and  idlers  have  gained  the  day.  All  their  tediousness  they  can 
now  bestow  on  their  neighbours. 

In  1760  the  Corporation  passed  a  law  which  would  have 
greatly  limited  fagging;  but  it  was  vetoed  by  the  overseers.1 
Judge  Story  says  that  this  bad  custom  was  dying  out  when  he 
entered  Harvard  in  1794.  "I  believe,"  he  adds,  "my  own 
Class  was  the  first  that  was  not  compelled,  at  the  command  of 
the  Senior  Class,  to  perform  the  drudgery  of  the  most  humble 
services."  "  My  father,"  writes  the  Judge's  son,  "  was  very 
active  in  this  reform.  He  invited  his  own  fag  to  his  room, 
treated  him  with  cordiality,  and  made  him  his  friend." 2  Fag- 
ging subsided  into  what  is  known  in  American  colleges  as 
hazing — horse-play,  more  or  less  brutal,  to  which  Freshmen  are 
subjected.  "President  Quincy,"3  writes  Professor  Peabody, 
"  laboured  persistently  to  establish  it  as  a  rule  that  the  students 
of  Harvard  College  should  be  held  amenable  to  the  civil 
authority  for  crimes  against  the  law  of  the  land,  even  though 
committed  within  academic  precincts.  The  habits  of  the 
students  were  rude,  and  outrages,  involving  not  only  large 
destruction  of  property,  but  peril  of  life  —  as,  for  instance,  the 
blowing  up  of  public  rooms  in  inhabited  buildings  —  were 
occurring  every  year.  Mr.  Quincy  was  sustained  by  the  Gov- 
erning Boards,  but  encountered  an  untold  amount  of  hostility 
and  obloquy  from  the  students,  their  friends,  and  the  outside 
public.  He  persevered,  and  gradually  won  over  the  best  pub- 
lic opinion  to  his  view.  The  principle  is  still  admitted,  and  I 
cannot  but  think  that  it  ought  to  be  practically  recognized  with 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  134.  2  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  I.  49. 

3  President  of  Harvard  from  1829  to  1845. 


IV.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  61 

regard  to  all  forms  of  misconduct  that  are  punishable  outside 
of  the  college  walls.  While  the  detestable  practice  of  hazing 
was  rife,  crimes  that  were  worthy  of  the  penitentiary  were  of 
frequent  occurrence,  resulting  in  some  cases  in  driving  a  perse- 
cuted Freshman  from  college  ;  in  many  instances,  in  serious  and 
lasting  injury ;  and  once,  at  least,  in  fatal  illness,  The  usual 
college  penalty  punished  the  parents  alone.  The  suspended l 
student  was  escorted  in  triumph  on  his  departure  and  his  return, 
and  was  the  hero  of  his  class  for  the  residue  of  his  college  life. 
I  remember  an  instance  in  which  a  timid  Freshman  had  his 
room  forcibly  entered  at  midnight,  his  valuables  stolen,  and  a 
bucket  of  cold  water  poured  upon  him  as  he  lay  trembling  in 
his  bed.  Had  the  perpetrators  of  that  crime  been  certain  that, 
in  case  of  detection,  they  would  be  indicted  for  burglary,  and 
punished  by  a  year  or  two  of  imprisonment,  they  would  no 
more  readily  have  broken  into  a  Freshman's  room  than  into  a 
jeweller's  shop."  2 

If  this  was  the  treatment  that  awaited  the  Freshman,  the 
tears  of  fathers,  mothers,  and  sisters,  in  the  midst  of  which  he 
left  home,  as  described  in  Fair  Harvard,  are  not  surprising. 
It  was,  with  good  reason,  Launce  over  again  —  "  my  mother 
weeping,  my  father  wailing,  my  sister  crying,  our  maid  howling, 
our  cat  wringing  her  hands,  and  all  our  house  in  a  great 
perplexity." 

It  would  not  be  amiss  if  in  our  own  universities  the  worst 
forms  of  outrage  were  made  amenable  to  'the  civil  authority. 
The  drunken  boating-men,  who,  only  two  summers  ago,  broke 
into  one  of  the  Oxford  colleges,  and  in  a  wild  riot  laid  property 
waste,  would  have  been  more  fitly  punished  by  a  jail  than  by 
a  money  penalty.  The  heavy  fine  that  was  inflicted  on  the 

1  Rusticated.  2  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  31. 


62  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

ringleader  was  raised  by  a  subscription  among  the  undergradu- . 
ates  of  the  very  College  which  he  had  outraged.  He,  not  to 
be  wanting  in  magnanimity,  presented  its  Boating  Club  with  a 
silver  bowl.  What  but  a  prison  should  have  been  the  fate  of 
the  Christ  Church  men,  who,  some  years  earlier,  broke  into  the 
Library,  and  brought  from  it  an  ancient  statue  which  they  cast 
into  a  bonfire?  In  another  large  College,  of  late  years  men 
have  more  than  once  shown  themselves  the  fellows  of  the 
ruffians  who  not  long  ago  carried  terror  into  the  West  End  of 
London.  Ruffianism,  wherever  found,  whether  in  the  courts 
of  a  college  or  in  the  streets  of  a  town,  should  •  meet  with  the 
same  stern  treatment.  Indulged,  or  feebly  treated,  it  may,  in 
our  ancient  universities,  lead  to  some  terrible  disaster  —  to  loss 
of  life  or  destruction  by  fire  of  some  noble  and  venerable 
building. 

In  Oxford,  as  in  Harvard,  "  the  suspended  student "  —  the 
rusticated  undergraduate  —  is  sometimes  escorted  in  triumph 
on  his  departure.  A  few  years  ago  a  ridiculous  scene  was  wit- 
nessed in  Broad  Street  —  a  long  procession  of  thirty  or  forty 
cabs,  following,  at  a  foot-pace,  some  great  but  luckless  hero, 
who,  for  a  season,  was  exiled  from  his  University. 

"Hazing"  —  to  use  the  American  term  —  in  its  less  brutal 
form  is  not  unknown  at  the  present  day  in  Oxford.  In  every 
college  this  rude  horse-play  may  break  out  from  time  to  time, 
and  in  some  few  within  the  last  forty  years  it  has,  for  short 
periods,  been  carried  to  a  shameful  height.  Those,  however, 
who  have  suffered  from  it  are  few  indeed  compared  with  the 
whole  mass  of  undergraduates.  In  my  own  College  I  can  re- 
call but  one  solitary  instance  of  persecution.  The  victim  was 
singularly  unfit  for  a  university.  Even  in  a  Quakers'  College 
he  would  have  been  made  a  butt.  Though  "  hazing"  is  still  rife 


iv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  63 

in  many  American  universities,  it  has  died  out  in  Harvard. 
With  "  window-smashing  and  disturbing  a  lecture-room,  it  is," 
writes  Professor  G.  H.  Palmer,  "  a  thing  of  the  past."  *  It  was 
in  the  autumn  of  1878  that  the  last  man  was  hazed. 

During  my  stay  in  Cambridge  there  was  a  slight  revival  of 
a  custom  which  seemed  to  have  almost  passed  away.  On  the 
first  Monday  of  the  academic  year,  known  as  "  Bloody  Mon- 
day "  in  many  American  colleges,  it  has  been  the  habit  for  the 
Sophomores —  the  second  year's  men  —  to  "  rush  "  the  Fresh- 
men. Between  these  two  classes  there  exists,  why  I  know  not, 
"  an  instinctive  antagonism."  At  Oxford  there  is  nothing  that 
exactly  corresponds  to  the  American  Sophomore,  "  a  being  who 
at  best  has  his  peculiarities,"  and  is  full  of  "a  sense  of  self-suf- 
ficiency."2 Our  second  year's  men  are  in  no  way  a  peculiar 
people.  The  peculiarities  and  self-sufficiency  would  be  more 
commonly  found  in  the  Freshmen,  at  all  events  in  their  second 
or  third  term.  So  great  at  Harvard  used  to  be  the  antagonism 
between  the  two  classes  that  to  the  timid  Freshman  this  first 
Monday  was  a  night  of  "  terrors  and  torments." 3  The  more 
daring  met  their  enemies  openly  in  the  Yard.  Each  set  formed 
in  ranks,  nine  rows  deep,  with  arms  locked.  On  the  signal 
being  given,  they  met  together  in  a  rush.  In  the  scuffle  bloody 
noses  were  sometimes  given,  clothes  torn,  and  hats  carried  off 
as  lawful  booty.  The  Freshmen  were  let  to  know  that  there 
was  no  surer  way  of  gaining  admittance  into  some  of  the  more 
exclusive  clubs  than  by  a  display  of  prowess  on  this  great  night. 
A  pair  of  black  eyes,  heroically  earned,  would  have  made  their 
proud  possessor  welcomed  with  acclamation.  As  the  Harvard 

1  The  New  Education^  G.  H.  Palmer,  Boston,  1887,  p.  28. 

2  The  New  Education,  p.  88. 

8  An  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  by  W.  R.  Thayer,  p.  50. 


64  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Yard  is  not  enclosed  by  a  wall,  rough  fellows  from  outside, 
when  once  the  tumult  began,  could  easily  take  part  in  it.  Last 
year,  after  a  long  interval  of  peace,  these  hostile  lines  were 
once  more  formed,  though  neither  was  the  combat  waged  with 
the  high  spirit  of  old,  nor  were  more  than  a  small  number  out 
of  the  two  classes  engaged.  I  was  told  by  a  student  that  a 
knot  of  outsiders  had  been  seen  waiting,  who  no  doubt  at  once 
joined  in.  He  added  that  a  force  of  twenty  policemen  had 
been  present,  who  had  "  batoned  "  the  undergraduates.  The 
twenty,  I  learnt,  had  grown  by  rumour  out  of  five.  These  five 
had  been  kept  out  of  sight,  but  when  neither  Sophomores  nor 
Freshmen  would  disperse  on  the  repeated  summons  of  the 
Proctor  who  had  the  charge  of  order  that  night,  they  were 
called  out  and  were  ordered  to  make  some  arrests.  Two  stu- 
dents were  taken  to  the  Police  Station,  followed  by  a  great 
crowd.  The  prisoners,  as  so  often  happens  in  such  a  case, 
proved  to  be  very  quiet  youths  and  were  soon  set  free.  The 
police  had  perhaps  shown  some  of  that  wisdom  which  Dog- 
berry enjoins,  and  had  only  seized  those  who  would  stand  when 
they  were  bidden. 

The  regulations  about  dress  last  century,  though  somewhat 
minute,  were  far  less  troublesome  and  absurd  than  those  which 
were  enforced  at  Oxford.  There  was  none  of  that  elaborate 
dressing  of  the  hair  which,  in  each  college,  kept  the  junior 
members  in  a  constraint  almost  as  ignoble  as  if  they  had  been 
set  in  the  stocks.  They  had  to  pass  under  the  College  barber's 
hands  at  least  two  hours  before  the  early  dinner  —  the  Seniors 
coming  last.  When  once  they  had  been  pomatomed  and  pow- 
dered exercise  was  impossible.  "  A  man  might  be  a  drunkard, 
a  debauchee,  and  yet  long  escape  the  Proctor's  animadver- 
sion :  but  no  virtue  could  protects  you  if  you  walked  on  Christ 


iv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  65 

Church  meadow  or  on  the  High  Street  with  a  band  tied  too  low, 
or  with  no  band  at  all ;  with  a  pig-tail,  or  with  a  green  or  scarlet 
coat."1  In  1786,  five  years  after  this  description  of  Oxford 
life  was  written,  the  Governing  Boards  of  Harvard  prescribed 
a  uniform.  What  the  colour  and  form  should  be  was  minutely 
set  forth.  Classes  were  to  be  distinguished  by  frogs  on  the 
cuffs  and  buttonholes.  Silk  was  prohibited  and  home  manu- 
factures were  recommended.2  Full  forty  years  later  these  rules 
were  to  some  extent  enforced.  "In  1824  undergraduates  were 
required  to  wear  a  uniform  consisting  entirely  of  black  cloth 
and  a  black  or  white  cravat.  The  coat  had  an  ornament 
worked  on  the  cuff  of  the  sleeve  in  black  silk  braid  which 
was  called  a  '  crow's  foot.'  A  Sophomore  wore  one  of  these 
badges,  a  Junior  two,  and  a  Senior  three."3  In  1829  the 
waistcoat  had  to  be  of  "  black-mixed  or  black ;  or,  when  of 
cotton  or  linen  fabric,  of  white."  Sumner,  who,  in  spite  of 
admonition,  persisted  in  wearing  one  of  buff-colour,  "  was  sum- 
moned several  times  to  appear  before  the  Parietal  Board4  for 
disobedience ;  but  to  no  purpose.  Wearied  with  the  contro- 
versy the  Board  at  length  yielded.  There  is  a  memorandum 
on  his  College  bill  for  the  first  term  of  his  junior  year  —  *  Ad- 
monition for  illegal  dress.'  "  5  It  was  perhaps  in  commemora- 
tion of  his  triumph  over  authority  that,  seventeen  years  later, 
when  he  delivered  his  famous  oration  before  the  Harvard 
Phi  Beta  Society,  he  appeared  in  a  buff  waistcoat. 

1  Boswell's  Life  of  Johnson,  III.  13,  n.  4. 

2  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  277. 

8  Life  ofB.  R.  Curtis,  1879,  I.  23. 

*  "The  Proctors,  and  the  officers  of  instruction  who  reside  in  the  Uni- 
versity building,  or  in  buildings  to  which  the  superintendence  of  the  Uni- 
versity extends,  constitute  the  Parietal  Board."  —  Catalogue,  p.  32. 

5  Life  of  Charles  Sumner,  I.  52. 
F 


66  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

In  Harvard  down  to  the  present  time  there  has  been  little 
of  that  pleasant  friendly  intercourse  between  tutor  and  under- 
graduate which  so  commonly  exists  at  Oxford.  Much  as  our 
two  great  universities  suffer  as  places  of  learning  and  even  of 
instruction  from  the  college  system,  for  most  of  the  purposes 
of  social  life  they  are  admirably  adapted.  The  unmarried 
Fellows  living  in  College,  commonly  on  the  same  staircases  as 
the  undergraduates,  are  not  the  strangers  to  them  that  the 
Professors  are  in  Harvard.  Even  the  married  Fellows  and 
tutors  often  retain  a  set  of  rooms  where  they  can  receive  their 
guests.  They  have  the  use  also  of  the  Common  Room  for  all 
purposes  of  hospitality.  The  College  kitchen  is  at  their  service 
as  well  as  the  College  cook  and  the  ancient  College  plate. 
The  Oxford  breakfast-parties  used  to  be  proverbial  for  their 
pleasantness,  though  in  these  busier  days  they  are  giving  way 
to  luncheons.  At  such  gatherings  in  a  Fellow's  rooms  I  have 
in  late  years  often  met  with  great  pleasure  half  a  dozen  under- 
graduates, and  in  their  bright  looks  recalled  "  the  happy  morn- 
ing of  life  and  of  May,"  when  all  the  world  lay  at  our  feet. 
The  friendliness  of  the  relations  between  tutor  and  under- 
graduate has  greatly  increased  of  late  years.  In  my  time  we 
scarcely  came  across  our  tutors  save  in  the  Lecture  Room. 
On  Degree  Days,  however,  the  Dean  gave  a  formal  breakfast 
to  all  who  were  taking  their  degree,  and  to  a  few  undergradu- 
ates besides.  The  meal  was  abundant  and  good.  For  that 
brief  hour  our  host  dropped  the  don  as  far  as  he  could,  and 
assumed  somewhat  of  the  air  of  a  man  of  the  world.  He 
addressed  us  with  friendly  familiarity.  "Jones,  may  I  send 
you  some  of  this  chicken?  Smith,  will  you  help  yourself  to 
some  brawn?  Oxford,  you  know,  is  famous  for  its  brawn." 
If  there  were  any  present  who  were  taking  the  Master's  degree, 


IV.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  67 

the  party  broke  up  in  time  for  them  to  read  aloud  the  Thirty- 
nine  Articles  of  the  Church  in  the  presence  of  the  Dean,  and 
to  signify  their  assent  and  consent  to  them.  Unless  this  were 
done  the  degree  could  not  be  conferred.  I  remember  how  a 
friend  of  mine,  now  a  learned  Canon,  arrived  so  late  at  the 
breakfast  that  there  was  scarcely  time  for  him  to  read  the 
Articles,  and  none  to  swallow  a  single  mouthful.  The  good- 
natured  Dean  bade  him  begin  to  read  as  hard  as  he  could  and 
go  on  till  his  breath  failed  him,  when  he  himself  would  take  up 
the  wondrous  tale,  to  be  relieved  in  his  turn.  In  this  way, 
riding  and  tying  as  it  were,  they  scampered  through  the  whole 
Thirty-nine  Articles  just  in  time.  When  two  hours  after  break- 
fast we  returned  to  the  same  room  and  to  the  same  table, 
though  alas  !  very  differently  spread,  for  it  was  covered  with 
books,  the  change  was  chilling.  "Mr.  Smith,  you  were  not 
at  my  lecture  yesterday."  "  Mr.  Jones,  I  hardly  think  your 
rendering  of  that  passage  would  satisfy  the  examiners."  The 
Master  of  the  College  now  and  then  invited  a  few  favoured 
youths  to  breakfast  or  dinner.  I  remember  how  the  great 
man,  as  some  sparkling  perry  was  poured  out,  impressively 
told  us  that  her  Majesty's  judges,  whom  as  Vice-Chancellor  he 
had  lately  entertained,  preferred  it  to  champagne.  He  was  a 
Canon  of  Gloucester  as  well  as  Master  of  Pembroke,  and  in 
the  great  orchard  country  had  learnt  the  excellence  of  perry. 
The  very  best,  such  as  we  were  drinking,  cost  him  but  two 
shillings  a  bottle,  whereas  for  his  champagne  he  paid  ten.  I 
sincerely  hope,  out  of  regard  to  the  character  of  a  man  who 
from  a  Canon  became  a  Dean,  and  from  a  Dean  a  Bishop,  that 
he  did  not  exaggerate  his  wine-merchant's  prices.  He  cer- 
tainly told  us  that  the  judges'  preference  of  his  perry  saved 
him  eight  shillings  a  bottle. 


68  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Far  more  formal  were  the  dinners  given  in  those  days  by  the 
Provost  of  Oriel.  It  was  not  till  the  morning  of  the  solemn 
day  that  he  issued  his  invitations.  All  were  expected  to  attend, 
whatever  may  have  been  their  engagements.  His  invitations 
were  of  the  nature  of  the  Queen's  —  they  were  veiled  com- 
mands. The  Junior  Fellow,  who  received  no  longer  notice 
than  the  undergraduates,  took  the  bottom  of  the  table.  When 
the  cloth  was  cleared  away  and  the  dessert  set  out,  the  Provost 
solemnly  addressed  him.  "Mr.  Robinson,  may  I  have  the 
pleasure  of  taking  a  glass  of  wine  with  you,  and  Mr.  Brown 
[turning  to  the  undergraduate  on  his  right]  will  you  join?" 
After  a  pause  he  challenged  in  like  manner  the  guest  on  his 
left,  joining  with  him  the  second  on  his  right.  In  this  manner 
he  slowly  and  solemnly  travelled  down  both  sides  of  the  table. 
In  the  drawing-room  no  undergraduate  might  sit  down  in  his 
awful  presence.  One  evening  a  young  sprig  of  the  nobility 
was  daring  enough  to  take  a  chair.  The  Provost  at  once  came 
up  as  if  to  engage  him  in  conversation,  whereupon  the  youth 
rose.  A  man-servant,  who  had  been  well-trained  in  his  duty, 
straightway  removed  the  chair. 

This  kind  of  formality  is  a  thing  of  the  past  in  Oxford. 
Some  few  traces  of  it  may  still  linger,  but  for  the  most  part 
between  old  and  young  there  is  familiarity  and  friendliness. 
In  one  of  the  Colleges,  on  a  Sunday  evening,  I  have  now  and 
then  attended  a  large  Literary  Society,  held  sometimes  in  a 
tutor's  rooms,  sometimes  in  an  undergraduate's,  where  over 
tea,  coffee,  and  tobacco  all  meet  on  friendly  terms  with  no 
inequality  but  such  as  naturally  comes  from  greater  age  and 
greater  knowledge.  How  unlike  this  free  and  familiar  life  is 
to  the  restrained  and  distant  relations  which,  too  commonly 
though  not  always,  exist  at  Harvard  between  teachers  and 


iv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  69 

students  is  shown  by  a  passage  in  an  article  in  the  Harvard 
Monthly^  Last  September,  at  the  beginning  of  the  academic 
year,  the  President  and  the  Professors  for  the  first  time  gave  a 
kind  of  reception  to  the  Freshmen. 

"The  manner  in  which  the  Class  of  '9 7 2  was  received  this 
year  [writes  the  editor]  showed  very  plainly  the  existence  of 
a  new  policy  in  the  conduct  of  the  University.  Heretofore  a 
Freshman  entered  college  with  almost  no  idea  of  his  responsi- 
bilities, or,  indeed,  of  his  advantages.  He  did  not  come  into 
contact  with  the  Faculty,  unless,  perhaps,  it  was  in  consultation 
with  the  Dean  on  some  matters  of  entrance  examinations.  He 
had  no  knowledge  of  those  who  directed  the  academic  life  of 
his  surroundings.  The  Faculty  was  something  to  be  avoided 
as  disagreeable  and,  in  most  ways,  useless.  He  knew  nothing 
of  the  eminent  scholars  from  whom  he  might  derive  benefit, 
since  his  instructors  were  simply  his  taskmasters,  who,  after  all, 
could  do  but  little  if  his  daily  tale  of  bricks  was  found  incom- 
plete. Thus  he  was  shut  off  from  one  side  of  undergraduate 
life.  Perhaps  it  was  years  before  he  saw  his  one-sidedness ; 
possibly  he  went  on  during  his  entire  college  career  with  an 
idea  that  courses  were  bad  because  they  emanated  from  a 
Faculty  which  he  had  never  known  except  as  his  stern,  and 
hence  disagreeable,  censors.  All  this  has  of  late  undergone  a 
radical  change.  The  schoolboy  who  became  a  member  of 
Harvard  College  last  month  had  the  privilege  of  meeting  his 
governors  on  grounds  of  social  freedom  which  have  been  here- 
tofore unknown.  His  duties  and  opportunities  were  clearly 
set  before  him  by  representative  men,  scholars,  and  athletes ; 

1  October,  1893,  p.  37. 

2  The  Freshmen  of  1893  are  known  as  the  class  of  1897,  because  it  is 
in  that  year  that  they  will  graduate. 


70  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

he  was  formally  welcomed  by  the  President,  and  started  upon 
his  college  career  with  the  feeling  that  the  Faculty  of  Arts  and 
Sciences  was  composed  of  most  delightful  men,  neither  so  stern 
nor  so  stupid  as  he  had  expected.  Authority  must  be  seen  to 
be  respected.  An  emperor  that  absents  himself  from  his  peo- 
ple's sight  will  find  but  little  loyalty  among  his  subjects  when 
he  may  be  pleased  to  show  himself.  In  former  years  the 
Faculty  have  held  more  or  less  aloof  from  a  visible  participa- 
tion in  college  interests,  and  the  respect  for  their  authority 
has  declined  in  proportion  as  they  have  so  acted.  Fortunately, 
however,  we  seem  to  have  just  witnessed  the  beginning  of  a 
new  policy,  which  will  doubtless  tend  to  weld  more  closely 
together  the  various  parts  of  our  University."  I  am  told  that 
there  is  a  good  deal  of  exaggeration  in  this  account,  and  that 
not  a  few  of  the  Professors  are  on  terms  of  friendly  social  inter- 
course with  many  of  their  pupils. 

Professor  Peabody,  writing  of  Harvard  as  he  first  knew  it  sixty 
years  ago,  says :  "  Though  no  student  dared  to  go  to  a  tutor's 
room  by  daylight,  it  was  no  uncommon  thing  for  one  to  come 
furtively  in  the  evening  to  ask  his  teacher's  aid  in  some  diffi- 
cult problem  or  demonstration.  The  students  certainly  con- 
sidered the  Faculty  as  their  natural  enemies.  There  existed 
between  the  two  parties  very  little  of  kindly  intercourse,  and 
that  little  generally  secret.  It  was  regarded  as  a  high  crime 
by  his  class  for  a  student  to  enter  a  recitation-room  [lecture- 
room]  before  the  ringing  of  the  bell,  or  to  remain  to  ask  a 
question  of  the  instructor ;  even  one  who  was  uniformly  first  in 
the  class-room  would  have  had  his  way  to  Coventry  made  easy. 
The  Professors  performed  police  duty  as  occasion  seemed  to 
demand."1  For  a  youth  to  be  intimate  with  the  tutors  in 

1  Harvard  Reminiscences,  pp.  183,  200. 


IV.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  71 

Judge  Story's  time  "  would  have  exposed  him  to  the  imputa- 
tion of  being  what  in  technical  language  was  called  a  '  fisher- 
man'—  a  rank  and  noxious  character  in  college  annals."1 
That  in  those  days  this  ill-will  existed  is  not  surprising,  for  the 
discipline  of  Harvard,  in  one  respect,  was  more  like  that  of  a 
French  boarding-school  than  of  a  university.  "  The  l  grouping ' 
of  students  used  to  be  a  penal  offence,  two  having  been  a  suffi- 
cient number  to  constitute  a  group;  while  in  at  least  one 
instance  an  extra-zealous  Proctor  reported  a  solitary  student 
as  evidently  waiting  to  be  joined  by  another,  and  thus  offering 
himself  as  a  nucleus  for  a  group."2  Even  in  Vienna,  under 
the  rule  of  the  Hapsburgs,  a  group  cannot  be  formed,  I  believe, 
unless  there  are  five  people  gathered  together.  Four  may  stop 
in  the  street  and  talk  about  the  weather,  without  much  risk  of 
being  meddled  with.  Professor  Peabody  describes  how  in 
1832  he  and  another  tutor  "had  the  chief  charge  of  the  police 
in  the  College  Yard.  The  rooms  of  the  tutors  and  proctors 
were  at  that  time  fully  furnished  by  the  College,  and  dark- 
lanterns  were  among  the  essential  items  of  furniture.  Bonfires 
had  been  of  frequent  occurrence  in  the  Yard.  The  fires  were 
made  of  wood  from  the  students'  own  wood-piles.  [The  bon- 
fires in  an  Oxford  quadrangle  are  too  often  made  of  chairs 
and  tables  not  brought  from  the  rooms  of  those  who  make  the 
fire.]  The  chief  object  of  these  fires  was  to  bring  out  the 
posse  of  parietal  officers  in  chase  of  the  moving  groups,  that 
scattered  when  they  approached,  and  dodged  the  dark-lan- 
tern when  the  slide  was  removed.  We  determined  to  direct 
our  attention  to  the  fire,  and  not  to  the  students.  We  pulled 
the  ignited  sticks  apart ;  and  when  the  fire  was  thus  arrested 
we  conveyed  the  fuel  to  our  own  rooms.  After  two  or  three 

1  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  I.  50.  2  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  207. 


72  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

experiments,  the  students  grew  tired  of  furnishing  kindling- 
wood  to  their  teachers;  and  the  wonted  blaze  and  outcry 
ceased  for  the  rest  of  the  year."1 

To  bridge  the  distance  which  even  in  late  years  has  existed 
between  teachers  and  pupils,  between  old  and  young,  one  re- 
ception at  the  beginning  of  the  academic  year  can  do  but 
little.  It  is  a  sign,  however,  of  a  better  day.  I  wish  some 
generous  and  wealthy  benefactor  would  rise,  some  hospitable 
man  who  knows  how  much  a  pleasant  meal  removes  awe  and 
gives  us  "  suppler  souls,"  who  would  provide  Harvard  with  a 
Hall  for  the  Professors,  Assistant-Professors,  Tutors,  and  In- 
structors, a  noble  kitchen,  a  good  cellar,  a  stock  of  old  wine, 
and  half  a  dozen  Common  Rooms.  Perhaps,  large  though 
the  staff  is,  one  Common  Room  would  suffice  at  first,  till  the 
art  of  using  it  had  been  acquired.  Two  or  three  of  the  most 
promising  young  men  might  be  sent  over  to  Oxford  for  a  year 
to  study  social  life.  They  would  see  how  even  the  married^ 
Professors  and  tutors  share  in  it,  dining  at  least  once  a  week  in 
College.  No  man  thinks  himself  too  old  to  dine  in  hall.  The 
generous  hospitality  of  the  place  brings  the  men  of  the  differ- 
ent colleges  together.  The  stranger  too  shares  in  it,  and  sees 
a  side  of  academic  life  which  is  found  only  in  England.  He 
dines  in  a  noble  hall,  adorned  by  the  portraits  of  former 
students  who,  in  one  way  or  another,  had  gained  distinction  in 
the  world ;  from  the  dais  on  which  he  sits  he  looks  down  upon 
the  rows  of  tables  filled  with  men  all  in  the  freshness  of  youth  ; 
as  all  stand  up  for  the  Latin  grace  he  notices  the  picturesque 
gowns,  which  by  their  shape  mark  the  different  ranks  of  those 
who  wear  them.  After  dinner  he  is  taken  to  a  Common  Room 
dark  with  oaken  wainscot  —  the  room  perhaps  where  James 

1  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  170. 


IV.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  73 

the  Second's  arbitrary  court  was  held,  and  where  Addison,  per- 
haps, first  learnt  to  like  that  wine  which  shortened  his  days, 
and  enabled  him,  at  the  early  age  of  forty-seven,  to  show  his 
step-son  "  how  a  Christian  can  die."  If  it  was  in  Addison's 
College  that  our  stranger  dines,  he  may  have  noticed  a  lad 
perched  on  a  stool  in  a  corner,  close  behind  the  President's 
chair.  It  is  a  little  chorister,  ready  to  chant  grace  if  he  is 
called  on ;  in  any  case  to  be  rewarded  with  a  slice  of  pudding. 
In  my  College  the  signal  for  grace  used  to  be  given  by  three 
blows  struck  with  one  small  piece  of  board  on  another  —  three 
blows,  no  doubt,  in  honour  of  the  Trinity.  The  custom  has 
been  allowed  to  die  out.  "  I  have  always  noticed,"  wrote  the 
antiquary  Hearne,  on  hearing  pan-cake  bell  on  Shrove  Tues- 
day ring  at  eleven  o'clock  instead  of  at  half-past  ten,  "  that 
when  laudable  old  customs  are  changed  learning  decays." 
Happily,  in  the  present  case,  this  observation  has  not  been 
verified.  Everywhere  in  Oxford  the  stranger  finds  something 
that  is  curious  —  something  unlike  all  that  he  has  ever  seen 
before.  Such  customs  cannot  be  transplanted,  they  must 
grow.  No  university  can  exclaim  "  Go  to ;  I  will  be  venera- 
ble." Let  Harvard  once  get  two  or  three  Common  Rooms 
built,  and  hospitable  customs  will  begin  slowly  to  form.  In 
these  rooms  the  teachers  of  the  University  will  be  able,  not 
only  to  entertain  their  friends  and  the  chance-comer,  but  also 
to  meet  their  pupils  "sine  ulla  solemnitate  "  in  friendly  gather- 
ings. In  Oxford  the  Common  Room  is  often  borrowed  by  one 
of  the  Fellows  for  a  private  party.  How  pleasant  are  the 
breakfasts  and  lunches  that  are  given  !  At  one  of  them  I  had 
the  honour  to  meet  the  widow  and  the  son  of  President  Gar- 
field.  It  is  nearly  sixty  years  since  Longfellow  recorded  in 
his  Journal:  "  Exhibition.  Everett  presides  with  dignity,  but 


74  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

cannot  always  lay  hold  of  his  collegiate  cap  in  the  right  place. 
Did  not  dine  with  the  College ;  I  have  not  for  a  long  time, 
and  shall  not  till  they  have  a  proper  dining-room  and  service."1 

The  strictness  of  the  discipline,  added  to  the  indifferent 
quality  of  the  "  Commons,"  often  led  to  rebellions.  The  rest- 
less spirit  of  the  age  no  doubt  favoured  insubordination ;  for  of 
the  more  famous  of  these  outbreaks  the  earliest  took  place  in 
1768,  a  few  years  before  the  Revolution.  When  once  the 
fashion  was  established,  it  was  likely  to  be  kept  up  in  time  of 
general  tranquillity.  It  went  on  at  least  as  late  as  1841.  In 
1768,  "the  tutors'  windows  were  broken  with  brickbats 
and  their  lives  endangered."  Three  students  were  expelled. 
But  so  weak  were  both  the  Corporation  and  the  overseers  that 
within  a  few  months  their  punishment  was  remitted,  mainly,  if 
not  entirely,  because  "  many  who  have  been  great  friends  and 
benefactors  to  the  Society  have  condescended  to  intercede  in 
their  behalf."  The  aged  President  Holyoke,  as  his  last  official 
act,  entered  on  the  records  of  both  Boards  his  protest  against 
this  unworthy  conduct.2 

At  the  Harvard  rebellion  of  1768  "the  scholars  met  in  a 
body  under  and  about  a  great  tree  to  which  they  gave  the  name 
of  the  Tree  of  Liberty." 3  I  do  not  know  whether  an  earlier 
instance  can  be  found  of  those  Trees  of  Liberty  which,  in  little 
more  than  twenty  years,  were  to  become  notorious  in  France. 
This  Harvard  tree  some  years  after  was  either  blown  down  or 
cut  down.  Another  Liberty  Tree  was  soon  chosen ;  it  is  still 
standing  and  plays  a  great  part  every  Class  Day.  It  has  long 
ceased  to  be  revolutionary  and  is  recognized  by  authority. 

iLife  of  H.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  37. 

2  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  116. 

9  An  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  by  W.  R.  Thayer,  p.  51. 


iv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  75 

Professor  E.  T.  Charming,  whose  admirable  lectures  in  Eng- 
lish kept  his  pupils  generally  free  from  the  extravagances  of 
the  Edward  Everett  School,  "  was  not  [we  are  told]  graduated 
in  course,  as  he  was  involved  in  the  famous  rebellion  of  1807, 
one  of  the  few  in  which  the  students  seem,  on  the  whole,  not 
to  have  been  in  the  wrong."  On  this  Professor  Peabody  re- 
marks :  "  I  object  to  this  statement  as  not  broad  enough. 
I  am  inclined  to  think  that  in  College  Rebellions  the  students 
were  always  in  the  right  as  to  principle,  though  injudicious  in 
their  modes  of  actualizing  principle.  There  was  not  one  of 
those  rebellions  in  which  the  leaders  were  not  among  the  fore- 
most in  their  respective  classes,  in  character  no  less  than  in 
scholarship.  There  were  traditional  maxims  and  methods  of 
college  jurisprudence  to  which  the  professional  mind  had  be- 
come hardened,  which  to  unsophisticated  youth  justly  seemed 
at  variance  with  natural  right ;  and  there  was  no  form  of  collec- 
tive protest  that  they  could  make  which  was  not  deemed  rebel- 
lion in  such  a  sense  that  they  were  compelled  either  to  recant 
or  to  leave  college  under  censure.  College  rebellions  have  be- 
come impossible  because  the  rights  of  the  students  are  now 
fully  recognized,  their  sense  of  honour  held  sacred,  their  protests 
and  complaints  considered  carefully  and  kindly."  l 

Channing,  if  as  a  rebel  he  was  not  allowed  to  graduate,  as 
a  man  of  letters  had  an  honorary  degree  conferred  on  him 
twelve  years  later.  In  the  cases  of  other  men  the  College 
showed  its  leniency  or  its  penitence.  In  1823,  thirty-seven 
students,  who  had  protested  against  an  act  of  tyrannical  disci- 
pline, were  refused  their  degree.  Many  years  later  the  ordinary 
degree  was  given  them. 

There  was  one  rebellion  which  Professor  Peabody  must  have 

1  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  84. 


76  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  iv. 

witnessed  in  which  the  students  do  not  seem  to  have  been  in 
the  right,  even  as  to  principle.  Longfellow  wrote  on  July  5, 
1841  :  "You  have  probably  seen  by  the  papers  that  we  have 
had  a  rebellion  in  College.  It  lasted,  however,  only  two  days. 
All  is  again  quiet  and  orderly.  There  was  never  a  more  silly 
and  boyish  outbreak,  nor  one  with  less  cause.  Two  students 
have  been  expelled,  and  six  dismissed  from  College."  J 

1  Life  of  H.  W,  Longfellow,  I.  379.  "  Dismission  closes  a  student's  con- 
nection with  the  University,  without  necessarily  precluding  his  return." 
—  Harvard  Catalogue,  p.  32. 


CHAPTER  V. 

Odd  Characters.  —  Changes  of  Names  of  Places.  —  Commencement  Day.  — 
Lafayette.  —  Russian  Naval  Officers.  —  Oxford  Commemoration.  — 
The  Association  of  the  Alumni. — The  Classes. — The  After-dinner 
Speeches. 

STORIES  are  handed  down,  in  Harvard,  of  presidents  and 
professors  much  as  they  are  in  Oxford.  I  have  been  told 
that  the  late  Master  of  Balliol  sometimes  unconsciously  amused 
a  party  of  undergraduates  whom  he  was  entertaining  at  break- 
fast by  telling  anecdotes  of  the  Master  of  his  early  days,  which 
among  his  young  guests  were  current  about  himself.  An  old 
Fellow  of  a  college,  after  he  had  sat  musing  for  a  while,  said 
to  a  friend :  "  When  you  and  I  were  young,  there  were  so 
many  odd  characters  about  the  University.  How  is  it  that 
there  are  none  now?"  "We  are  the  odd  characters,"  his 
friend  replied.  I  hope  that  Harvard  of  the  present  day  can 
boast  of  its  odd  characters.  It  is  only  a  brand-new  university, 
just  turned  fresh  out  of  the  hands  of  a  millionaire,  that  should 
have  none.  That  there  were  some  of  old  in  the  American 
Cambridge  is  shown  by  Professor  Peabody  in  his  lively 
Reminiscences.  There  was  Professor  Popkin  who  "was  not 
without  a  nickname  which  he  accepted  as  a  matter  of  course 
from  the  students;  but  hearing  it  on  one  occasion  from  a 
young  man  of  dapper,  jaunty,  unacademic  aspect,  he  said  to  a 
friend  who  was  standing  with  him,  'What  right  has  that  man 
to  call  me  Old  Pop?  He  was  never  a  member  of  Harvard 

77 


78  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

College.'"1  Longfellow,  going  one  day  to  the  Episcopal 
Church  in  Cambridge,  the  church  which  Washington  at- 
tended, saw  there,  "Popkin,  standing  hoary-headed,  red- 
faced,  with  a  narrow-caped,  blue  greatcoat,  looking  very 
much  like  a  beadle,  and  dragging  along  his  heavy  vocables 
considerably  in  the  rear  of  the  rest  of  the  congregation."2 
Lowell  describes  his  "great  silver  spectacles  of  the  heroic 
period,  such  as  scarce  twelve  noses  of  these  degenerate  days 
could  bear."8  "Imagine,"  writes  Professor  Goodwin,  "the 
venerable  Dr.  Popkin  stepping  calmly  out  of  his  door  on  the 
West  Cambridge  road,  and  waving  his  historic  umbrella  to 
stop  an  electric  car  as  it  goes  whizzing  by."  4  There  was  also 
Professor  Hedge  who  had  written  a  work  on  Logic,  and,  ac- 
cording to  popular  report,  was  in  the  habit  of  saying  to  his 
class :  "  It  took  me  fourteen  years,  with  the  assistance  of  the 
adult  members  of  my  family,  to  write  this  book;  and  I  am 
sure  that  you  cannot  do  better  than  to  employ  the  precise 
words  of  the  learned  author."  6 

President  Kirkland,  "a  jolly  little  man,"  as  Longfellow 
describes  him,6  seems  to  have  been  a  wit.  In  his  day  the 
dogma  of  "the  perseverance  of  the  saints"  was  hotly  dis- 
cussed, the  dogma,  that  is  to  say,  that  a  man  who  has  once 
been  brought  to  a  state  of  grace  can  never  fall  from  it. 
"  When  a  country  deacon  called  on  the  President  for  advice 
about  a  quarrel  that  had  sprung  up  in  his  church  concerning 

1  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  45.     This  same  story,  I  am  told,  is  now 
current  of  another  member  of  the  professorial,  or  more  correctly,  the 
tutorial  staff.     His  nickname  was  Piggy. 

2  Life  of  H.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  132. 

8  Literary  Essays,  by  J.  R.  Lowell,  1890,  I.  91. 

4  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  6. 

5  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  38.         6  Life  offf.  W.  Longfellow,  I.  71. 


V.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  79 

this  dogma,  he  replied:  'Here  in  Boston  we  have  no  diffi- 
culty on  that  score;  what  troubles  us  here  is  the  perseverance 
of  the  sinners.'"1  Lowell,  in  his  Cambridge  Thirty  Years 
Ago?  gives  a  pleasant  account  of  the  kindly  old  fellow.  "  This 
life  was  good  enough  for  him,  and  the  next  not  too  good. 
The  gentlemanlike  pervaded  even  his  prayers.  His  were  not 
the  manners  of  a  man  of  the  world,  nor  of  a  man  of  the  other 
world  either  ;  but  both  met  in  him  to  balance  each  other  in  a 
beautiful  equilibrium.  Praying,  he  leaned  forward  upon  the 
pulpit-cushion,  as  for  conversation,  and  seemed  to  feel  him- 
self (without  irreverence)  on  terms  of  friendly,  but  courteous 
familiarity  with  heaven."  He  knew  well  how  to  deal  with 
undergraduates.  "Hearing  that  Porter's  flip  (which  was  ex- 
emplary) had  too  great  an  attraction  for  the  collegians,  he 
resolved  to  investigate  the  matter  himself.  Accordingly, 
entering  the  old  inn  one  day,  he  called  for  a  mug  of  it,  and 
having  drunk  it,  said,  'And  so,  Mr.  Porter,  the  young  gentle- 
men come  to  drink  your  flip,  do  they?  '  '  Yes,  sir, —  some- 
times.' 'Ah,  well,  I  should  think  they  would.  Good  day, 
Mr.  Porter,'  and  departed  saying  nothing  more;  for  he  always 
wisely  allowed  for  the  existence  of  a  certain  amount  of  human 
nature  in  ingenuous  youth.  At  another  time  the  '  Harvard 
Washington  [Corps] '  asked  leave  to  go  into  Boston  to  a  col- 
lation which  had  been  offered  them.  '  Certainly,  young  gen- 
tlemen, '  said  the  President,  '  but  have  you  engaged  any  one 
to  bring  home  your  muskets?  '  —  the  College  being  responsi- 
ble for  these  weapons,  which  belonged  to  the  State." 

Prescott,  writing  to  his  father  about  his  matriculation  ex- 
amination, lets   us   see  what  a  kindly  man   Kirkland  was. 

1  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  71. 

2  Literary  Essays,  by  J.  R.  Lowell,  1890,  I.  83. 


80  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

"  When  we  were  first  ushered  into  the  presence  of  the  Presi- 
dent and  Professors,  they  looked  like  so  many  judges  of  the 
Inquisition.  We  were  ordered  down  into  the  parlour,  almost 
frightened  out  of  our  wits,  to  be  examined  by  each  separately; 
but  we  soon  found  them  quite  a  pleasant  sort  of  chaps.  The 
President  sent  us  down  a  good  dish  of  pears,  and  treated  us 
very  much  like  gentlemen.  Professor  Ware  examined  us  in 
Grotius  de  veritate.  We  found  him  very  good-natured,  for  I 
happened  to  ask  him  a  question  in  theology,  which  made  him 
laugh  so  that  he  was  obliged  to  cover  his  face  with  his  hands." 1 
The  good  dish  of  pears  must  have  been  a  pleasant  break  to  a 
long  day.  Professor  Peabody,  who  entered  Harvard  twelve 
years  later,  says  that  the  entrance  examination  "began  at  six 
in  the  morning,  and,  with  a  half -hour's  intermission  for  din- 
ner, lasted  till  sunset.  Each  of  thirteen  College  officers  took 
a  section,  and  passed  it  over  to  the  next,  and  so  on,  until  it 
had  gone  the  entire  round."  2 

Kirkland's  memory  is  preserved  in  Cambridge  by  one  of 
those  changes  which  are  always  to  be  regretted.  "  I  am  come 
to  anchor  in  Professors'  Row,"8  wrote  Lowell.  It  is  in  vain 
that  the  literary  pilgrim  looks  for  Professors'  Row.  This 
pleasant  road  has  long  been  known  as  Kirkland  Street.  It  is 
not  a  street  according  to  our  use  of  the  word.  In  America, 
country  roads,  though  every  house  along  them  stands  alone  in 
its  own  grounds,  are  known  as  streets.  To  call  them  roads, 
as  is  now  sometimes  done,  is  looked  upon  as  an  affected 
imitation  of  the  English.  If  any  change  has  to  be  made 
avenue  is  the  word.  Even  Longfellow  wanted  to  give  a  new 
name  to  the  pleasant  road  in  which  he  lived.  In  his  Journal 

1  Life  of  W.  H.  Prcscott,  p.  13.  2  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  93. 

8  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  I.  300. 


V.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  81 

he  records :  "  Wrote  a  petition  to  have  the  name  of  our  street 
changed  from  Brattle  to  Vassall."  l  The  fine  old  mansion  in 
which  the  poet  passed  the  greater  part  of  his  life  had  been 
built  by  a  stubborn  Tory,  Colonel  John  Vassall,  who,  when  the 
Revolution  broke  out,  went  to  England,  and  erased  from  his 
coat-of-arms  the  motto,  Semper  pro  Republica  sape  pro  rege.z 
Had  the  change  been  made  more  would  have  been  lost  than 
gained,  for  the  old  name  of  the  street  awakens  ancient  memo- 
ries. "All  old  Cambridge  people,"  writes  Dr.  Holmes, 
"  know  the  Brattle  House,  with  its  gambrel  roof,  its  tall  trees, 
its  perennial  spring,  its  legendary  fame  of  good  fare  and  hos- 
pitable board  in  the  days  of  the  kindly  old  bon  vivant,  Major 
Brattle.  In  this  house,  Motley  lived  during  a  part  of  his 
College  course."8  Still  more  ancient  memories  hang  round 
the  name.  There  was  a  Thomas  Brattle  who  graduated  at 
Harvard  in  1676,  and  by  his  will  left  "half  a  crown  to  every 
student  belonging  to  the  College  who  should  attend  his 
funeral."  He  did  not  share  in  the  Puritans'  hatred  of  instru- 
mental music  in  churches;  for  he  bequeathed  his  organ  to  the 
church  in  Brattle  Street,  "  if  it  should  procure  a  sober  person 
that  can  play  skilfully  thereon  with  a  loud  noise."  If  the  gift 
on  this  condition  were  refused,  then  it  was  to  go  to  the 
Church  of  England  in  Boston,  and  if  it  were  again  refused, 
it  was  to  be  offered  to  Harvard.4  "We  change  our  names," 
wrote  Lowell,  "  as  readily  as  thieves,  to  the  great  detriment 
of  all  historical  association."  5 

Of  President  Quincy,  who  laboured  so  hard  to  uphold  the 
discipline  of  the  College,  Professor  Peabody  writes:    "He 

1  Life  offf.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  94.  *Ib.  I.  259. 

8  J.  L.  Motley,  by  O.  W.  Holmes,  p.  13.        *  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  41 1. 

6  Literary  Essays,  1890,  I.  54. 


82  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

seldom  remembered  a  face,  and  when  a  student  —  even  one 
sent  for  but  a  few  minutes  before  —  entered  his  study,  he  was 
encountered  by  the  question,  ' What's  your  name?  '  So  much 
was  this  his  habit,  that  if  it  so  happened  in  a  rare  instance 
that  he  did  recognize  a  countenance,  he  was  more  likely  than 
not  to  say,  'Well,  Brown,  what's  your  name?'"1  Early  in 
1 86 1,  the  old  gentleman  who,  yielding  to  age,  had  resigned 
his  office  sixteen  years  earlier,  in  defiance  of, the  severity  of 
a  New  England  spring,  and  of  the  eighty-nine  winters  which 
he  had  borne,  was  a  guest  of  the  famous  Saturday  Club  of 
Boston  —  the  Club  of  Emerson,  Longfellow,  Whittier,  Agassiz, 
Lowell,  Motley,  Sumner,  Dana,  and  Holmes,  the  Club  of 
which  Lowell  wrote  from  London,  at  the  very  time  that  he 
was  the  American  Minister  to  England :  "  I  have  never  seen 
society,  on  the  whole,  so  good  as  I  used  to  meet  at  our  Satur- 
day Club."2  Of  this  dinner  in  1861  Longfellow  recorded  in 
his  Journal:  "At  the  Club  old  President  Quincy  was  our  gues*^ 
and  was  very  pleasant  and  wise."8  He  lived  three  years 
longer.  When  he  died  Sumner,  who  in  his  undergraduate 
days  had  been  under  him  at  Harvard,  wrote  of  him :  "  Few 
lives  have  been  so  completely  filled  and  rounded  as  his,  always 
industrious,  faithful,  true,  and  noble."4 

That  New  England  was  settled  by  men  trained  in  a  univer- 
sity, and  not  by  a  set  of  eager,  pushing  adventurers,  is  shown 
both  by  the  early  foundation  of  Harvard  College,  and  also  by 
the  solemnity  with  which  from  the  beginning  Commencement 
was  kept.  Only  thirteen  years  after  Boston  was  settled,  and 
twenty-two  years  after  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  at 
Plymouth,  the  long  series  of  these  annual  celebrations  began 

1  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  33.  2  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  II.  307. 

8  Life  of  H.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  361.         *  Life  of  Charles  Sumner,  IV.  202. 


v.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  83 

in  the  American  Cambridge,  which,  broken  only  by  war  and 
pestilence,  still  runs  on,  and  is  likely  to  run  on  "till  the 
stock  of  the  Puritans  die." 

Labi  fur  et  lab  e  fur  in  omne  volubilis  avum. 

Before  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  day  was  kept 
in  all  the  country  round  as  the  great  holiday  of  the  Puritan 
Commonwealth.  What  was  sourly  refused  to  Christmas  was 
willingly  granted  to  Commencement.  Every  one  streamed 
out  of  Boston  across  the  Charles  River  or  up  it  in  boats.  The 
Governor,  escorted  by  his  body-guard,  came  in  state.  On 
the  Common  in  front  of  the  College,  a  fair  was  held.  The 
festivities  of  the  day  before  long  turned  to  license.  Feasts 
were  given  by  the  graduating  students  in  rooms,  where  "dis- 
tilled lyquours "  were  drunk.  The  use  of  strong  drink  was 
sometimes  forbidden  by  the  Governing  Bodies,  though  for- 
bidden in  vain.  Sometimes  it  was  tolerated.  One  easy- 
going Board,  who,  perhaps  through  the  unwonted  strength  of 
their  heads,  had  made  the  great  discovery  "  that  punch,  as  it 
is  now  usually  made,  is  no  intoxicating  liquor,"  allowed  the 
students  "  to  entertain  one  another  and  strangers  with  it, "  pro- 
vided it  was  done  "in  a  sober  manner."  In  the  use  of 
"plumb-cake"  the  excesses  were  so  great  that  so  early  as 
1693  the  Corporation  passed  a  vote  that,  "having  been  in- 
formed that  the  custom  taken  up  in  the  College,  not  used  in 
any  other  universities,  for  the  commencers  [members  of  the 
graduating  class]  to  have  plumb-cake,  is  dishonourable  to  the 
College,  not  grateful  to  wise  men,  and  chargeable  to  the  pa- 
rents of  the  commencers,  [the  Corporation]  do  therefore  put 
an  end  to  that  custom,  and  do  hereby  order  that  no  com- 
mencer,  or  other  scholar,  shall  have  any  such  cakes  in  their 


84  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

studies  or  chambers;  and  that  if  any  scholar  shall  offend 
therein,  the  cakes  shall  be  taken  from  him,  and  he  shall  more- 
over pay  to  the  College  twenty  shillings  for  each  such 
offence." 

By  1722  a  second  ordinance  was  needed;  for,  so  far  from 
"the  plumb-cake"  having  been  given  up,  to  it  had  been 
added  "roasted,  boyled,  baked  meats  and  pyes."  Some  art- 
ful youths  "went  about  to  evade  the  Act  by  plain  cake."  A 
third  ordinance  was  passed  five  years  later,  which  refused  any 
who  should  henceforth  so  transgress  their  degree.1 

The  disorders  both  inside  and  outside  the  College  grew  to 
such  a  head,  that  an  attempt  was  made  to  put  a  check  on 
them  by  keeping  secret  the  day  on  which  Commencement 
should  be  held.  The  general  outcry  was,  however,  too  strong 
for  the  Corporation  to  resist,  and  the  old  arrangement  was 
soon  resumed.  Even  the  very  pulpits  must  have  sounded 
against  them,  for,  according  to  Lowell,  "  the  one  great  holi- 
day of  the  clergy  of  Massachusetts  was  Commencement,  which 
they  punctually  attended."2  "In  1749  three  gentlemen  who 
had  sons  about  to  be  graduated,  offered  to  give  the  College  a 
thousand  pounds8  provided  *a  trial  was  made  of  Commence- 
ments this  year  in  a  more  private  manner.' '  The  Corpora- 
tion, mindful  of  the  lack  of  funds,  were  for  acquiescing, 
but  the  Overseers  would  consent  to  no  breach  in  the  old 
custom.  4 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  386  ;   II.  95  ;  An  Historical  Sketch,  p.  54. 

3  Harvard  University,  2$oth  Anniversary,  1887,  p.  21 1. 

3  "The  currency  of  account  in  New  England,  subsequent  to  1652,  was 
termed  lawful  money.  It  was  one-quarter  less  in  value  than  English  cur- 
rency of  account."  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  231.  One  thousand  pounds 
was  therefore  equal  to  seven  hundred  and  fifty  pounds  of  English  money. 

*  Ib.  1. 396  ;  II.  92. 


v.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  85 

During  the  War  of  the  Revolution,  Commencement  was  not 
kept;  but  when  the  celebrations  were  resumed  they  became 
more  popular  than  ever.  In  Boston  even  the  Custom  House 
and  the  banks  were  closed  on  the  great  day.  Professor  Pea- 
body,  describing  the  College  as  it  was  when  he  entered  it 
seventy  years  ago,  says :  "  The  entire  Common,  then  an  unen- 
closed dust-plain,  was  completely  covered  on  Commencement 
Day,  and  the  night  preceding  and  following  it,  with  drinking- 
stands,  dancing-booths,  mountebank  shows,  and  gambling- 
tables  ;  and  I  have  never  heard  such  a  horrid  din,  tumult,  and 
jargon  of  oath,  shout,  scream,  fiddle,  quarrelling,  and  drunk- 
enness as  on  those  two  nights.  By  such  summary  methods  as 
but  few  other  men  could  have  employed,  Mr.  Quincy,  at  the 
outset  of  his  presidency  [1829],  swept  the  Common  clear; 
and  during  his  entire  administration  the  public  days  of  the 
College  were  kept  free  from  rowdyism."1  That  Harvard  "in 
its  birth  and  purpose  was  a  religious  institution,"  strangely 
enough  added  to  the  disorder.  "Pious  citizens  of  Boston 
used  to  send  their  slaves  to  Commencement  for  their  religious 
instruction  and  edification.  But  the  negroes  soon  found  that 
they  could  spend  their  holidays  more  to  their  satisfaction,  if 
not  more  to  the  good  of  their  souls,  on  the  outside  than  in 
the  interior  of  the  meeting-house.  At  length  Commencement 
came  to  be  the  great  gala-day  of  the  year  for  the  coloured 
people  in  and  about  Boston,  who  were,  by  no  means,  such 
quiet  and  orderly  citizens  as  their  representatives  now  are, 
while  their  comparative  number  was  much  greater."  2  It  was 
as  if  in  Oxford,  Commemoration  and  St.  Giles  Fair  —  one  of 
the  last  left  us  of  the  great  English  fairs  —  were  held  on  the 
same  day. 

1  Harvard  Reminiscences,  p.  59.  2  Ib.  p.  26. 


86  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Close  to  the  Common  where  this  scene  of  riot  was  going 
on,  and  facing  the  College  gates,  stands  the  First  Parish 
Church,  parted  by  its  graveyard  alone  from  the  Episcopa- 
lian Church' where  Washington  had  his  pew. 

"  Like  sentinel  and  nun  they  keep 

Their  vigil  on  the  green : 
One  seems  to  guard  and  one  to  weep 
The  dead  that  lie  between." 

In  this  old  church,  for  a  century  and  a  half,  the  Commence- 
ment exercises  were  held  and  the  degrees  were  conferred. 
From  the  College  a  procession  was  formed,  which  is  thus  de- 
scribed as  it  was  seen  in  1725:  "The  Bachelors  of  Arts 
walked  first,  two  in  a  rank,  and  then  the  Masters,  all  bare- 
headed; then  followed  Mr.  Wadsworth  alone  as  President; 
next  the  Corporation  and  Tutors,  two  in  a  rank;  then  the 
Honourable  Lieutenant-Governor  and  Council,  and  next  to 
them  the  rest  of  the  gentlemen."1  The  President  sat  in  the 
old  chair  sung  of  by  the  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table :  — 

"  One  of  the  oddest  of  human  things, 
Turned  all  over  with  knobs  and  rings, 
But  heavy,  and  wide,  and  deep,  and  grand, 
Fit  for  the  worthies  of  the  land." 

The  exercises  were  all  in  Latin.  According  to  the  ancient 
fashion  of  universities,  there  was  a  "syllogistic  disquisition. 
When  the  disputations  were  going  on  the  President  had  often 
occasion  to  interpose  and  set  the  disputants  right.  This  was 
always  done  in  Latin."2  It  was  not  till  after  the  middle  of 
the  eighteenth  century  that  "the  walls"  of  the  church  "were 
disgraced  "  by  being  made  to  echo  English.8 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  377.  2  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  36. 

3  "  Dr.  Johnson  said  that  he  would  never  consent  to  disgrace  the  walls 
of  Westminster  Abbey  with  an  English  inscription."  BoswelPs  Life  of 
Johnson,  III.  85. 


v.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  87 

In  the  year  1824  Harvard,  in  common  with  the  rest  of  the 
country,  went  wild  with  excitement  over  General  Lafayette, 
who  had  crossed  the  sea  as  "the  Guest  of  the  Nation."  The 
triumphant  progress  of  "Grandison-Cromwell,"  the  most 
conspicuous  and  the  most  fatal  failure  of  the  French  Revolu- 
tion, astonishes  an  Englishman  who  knows  nothing  of  the 
services  rendered  nearly  fifty  years  earlier  by  the  gallant 
young  Frenchman  to  the  struggling  Colonies.  When  Edward 
Everett,  in  his  oration  at  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa  dinner  at  Har- 
vard, writes  one  who  was  present,  spoke  of  "  the  noble  con- 
duct of  our  guest  in  procuring  a  ship  for  his  own  transporta- 
tion, at  a  time  when  all  America  was  too  poor  to  offer  him  a 
passage  to  her  shores,  the  scene  was  overpowering;  every  one 
was  in  tears."1  At  every  town,  at  every  crossway,  crowds 
had  been  waiting  to  welcome  Lafayette  as  he  passed  onwards 
from  New  York  to  Boston.  Men  pressed  forward  to  shake  his 
hand,  and  babies  were  held  up  for  him  to  kiss,  so  that  if  they 
lived  to  be  old  men  and  women,  they  might  boast  that  this 
demigod  had  touched  them  with  his  lips.  "  If  Lafayette  had 
kissed  me,"  said  an  enthusiastic  lady,  "depend  upon  it,  I 
would  never  have  washed  my  face  again  as  long  as  I  lived !  "  '2 
Webster,  addressing  him  on  Bunker  Hill,  exclaimed:  "For- 
tunate, fortunate  man !  With  what  measure  of  devotion  will 
you  not  thank  God  for  the  circumstances  of  your  extraordinary 
life !  You  are  connected  with  both  hemispheres,  and  with 
two  generations.  Heaven  saw  fit  to  ordain  that  the  electric 
spark  of  liberty  should  be  conducted  through  you  from  the 
New  World  to  the  Old."8  It  was  perhaps  the  throng  of 
worshippers,  the  hand-shakings,  and  the  baby-kissings,  that 

1  J.  Quincy's  Figures  of  the  Past,  p.  107. 
2  Ib.  p.  153.  8  Webster's  Works,  I.  70. 


88  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

on  Commencement  Day  made  the  great  man  and  his  escort 
reach  the  College  nearly  two  hours  behind  time.  At  the  en- 
trance, as  an  eye-witness  records,1  "he  was  welcomed  by 
President  Kirkland  in  a  neat  and  peculiarly  appropriate  ad- 
dress." A  neat  address  to  welcome  the  hero  of  two  worlds! 
Nothing  but  a  neat  address !  Perhaps,  however,  to  be  merely 
neat  was  the  best  thing  "a  jolly  little  man "  could  do  who 
knew  that  there  was  an  Edward  Everett  with  his  never- 
failing  eaglet  to  follow.  Josiah  Quincy,  to  whom  had  been 
assigned  the  honour  of  the  Latin  "Valedictory,"  —  the  speech 
in  which  the  newly-made  Bachelor  in  the  name  of  his  com- 
rades bids  Alma  Mater  farewell,  —  has  left  an  account  of  the 
day.  "The  first  part  of  my  performance,"  he  writes,  "con- 
sisted of  mere  phrases  of  rhetorical  compliment,  thrown  out 
at  creation  in  general.  But  the  inevitable  allusion  came  at 
last.  I  had  drifted  among  the  heroes  of  the  Revolution,  and 
suddenly  turned  to  the  General  with  my  In  te  quoque,  Lafay- 
ette —  and  then  what  an  uproar  drowned  the  rest  of  the  sen- 
tence! The  entire  audience  upon  the  floor  had  sprung  to 
their  feet,  the  ladies  in  the  gallery  were  standing  also,  and 
were  waving  their  handkerchiefs  with  impassioned  ardour. 
It  was  the  last  opportunity  which  the  day  was  to  offer  to  pay 
homage  to  the  guest  of  America,  and,  as  if  by  one  consent, 
it  was  improved  to  the  utmost."2 

Such  scenes  of  triumph  Lafayette  had  not  witnessed  since 
that  memorable  Festival  of  the  Federation  on  the  Champ  de 
Mars,  when,  mounted  on  his  white  charger,  "  il  semblait  com- 
mander a  la  France  entiere."  A  wit,  pointing  him  out  to  a 

1  The  Rev.  John  Pierce,  quoted  in  W.  R.  Thayer's  Historical  Sketch  of 
Harvard  University,  p.  55. 

2  J.  Quincy's  Figures  of  the  Past,  pp.  55-57. 


v.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  89 

young  man  who  was  standing  near  him,  exclaimed :  "  Voyez- 
vous  M.  de  La  Fayette  qui  galope  dans  les  siecles  a  venir !  "  l 
Through  America  in  the  nineteenth  century  he  was  having  the 
first  of  these  gallops. 

The  excesses  from  the  too  free  use  of  wine  and  punch  at 
the  Commencement  dinners  began  more  than  fifty  years 
ago  to  move  the  friends  of  temperance.  The  Rev.  John 
Pierce,  one  of  those  useful  divines  who  keep  a  minute 
diary,  recorded  in  1836:  "Be  it  noted  that  this  is  the  first 
Commencement  I  ever  attended  in  Cambridge  in  which  I  saw 
not  a  single  person  drunk  in  the  Hall  or  out  of  it."  Perhaps 
this  most  irregular  regularity  of  conduct  may  be  accounted  for 
by  the  next  line  in  the  Diary :  "  There  were  the  fewest  pres- 
ent I  ever  remember."  Two  years  later  he  makes  the  follow- 
ing entry:  "Notwithstanding  the  efforts  of  the  friends  of 
temperance,  wine  was  furnished  at  dinner."2  But  a  more 
sober  day  was  dawning.  In  1846  Professor  Silliman  of  Yale, 
who  was  one  of  the  guests,  recorded :  "  There  was  no  wine  — 
only  lemonade;  the  very  first  instance  of  the  kind  that  has 
occurred  here."8 

What  a  change  had  come  over  the  University  since  those 
early  days  when  two  undergraduates  paid  part  of  their  term's 
charges  with  a  rundlet  of  sack,  and  a  Bachelor  of  Arts  was 
"credited  with  £i  8s.  od.  for  'sack  that  he  brought  into  Col- 
lege at  Commencement,  and  was  charged  upon  the  rest  of 
the  Commencement  according  to  their  proportion.'  "  4  What 
sound  morality  the  old  Puritans  could  draw  even  out  of  strong 

1  Memoires  du  General  Baron  Thiebault,  p.  261. 

2  Quoted  in  W.  R.  Thayer's  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  p.  56. 

3  Life  of  Benjamin  Silliman,  II.  32. 

4  The  Early  College  Buildings  at  Cambridge,  by  A.  M.  Davis,  1890,  p.  12. 


90  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

waters,  is  shown  by  the  following  passage  in  the  Diary  of 
Samuel  Sewall,  who  was  Chief  Justice  of  the  Commonwealth 
and  an  Overseer  of  Harvard  College.  "Sixth-day.  Oct.  i, 
1697.  Had  first  Butter,  Honey,  Curds  and  Cream.  For 
Diner,  very  good  Rost  Lamb,  Turkey,  Fowls,  Aplepy. 
After  Diner  sung  the  121  Psalm.  Note.  A  glass  of  spirits 
my  wife  sent  stood  upon  a  Joint-Stool  which  Simon  W.  jog- 
ging, it  fell  down  and  broke  all  to  shivers.  I  said  'twas  a 
lively  emblem  of  our  Fragility  and  Mortality."  1  It  was  not, 
we  may  feel  sure,  the  first  glass  that  had  been  brought  in  that 
day.  More  than  one  must  have  gone  to  the  making  of  so 
pious  a  reflection. 

It  is  not  easy  to  conceive  the  still  deeper  shade  of  melan- 
choly which  stole  over  the  great  Webster's  naturally  sad  face 
—  for  he  also  was  a  guest  at  the  Commencement  dinner  re- 
corded by  Professor  Silliman  —  as  he  contemplated  the  lem- 
onade bottle,  and  thought  of  the  old  Madeira  in  the  cellar  of 
his  pleasant  home  at  Marshfield.  "  Dost  thou  think  because 
thou  art  virtuous,"  he  might  have  cried  out  to  the  Rev.  John 
Pierce,  "there  shall  be  no  more  cakes  and  ale?"  He  was 
no  Dr.  Johnson  whose  face  about  five  o'clock  one  morning, 
towards  the  end  of  a  supper-party,  "shone  with  meridian 
splendour,  though  his  drink  had  been  only  lemonade."  A 
lady  at  whose  house  I  stayed  told  me  that  her  father  had  been 
a  great  admirer  of  Webster.  One  day  he  rode  fifty  miles  to 
hear  him  speak,  but  to  his  grief  found  that  his  hero  was  too 
far  gone  in  drink  to  be  able  to  utter  a  word. 

Since  1846  no  liquor  stronger  than  coffee  has  been  provided. 
The  thousand  graduates,  who  every  year  at  this  great  gathering 
dine  together  in  Memorial  Hall,  must  pledge  one  another  in 

1  Diary  of  Samuel  Sewall,  I.  460. 


v.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  91 

lemonade,  iced  water,  or  coffee.  At  the  dinner  last  summer 
I  sat  opposite  a  foreign  professor  on  whom  an  honorary  de- 
gree had  been  conferred.  I  was  struck  by  "the  dejected 
'haviour  of  his  visage."  It  might  have  been  due  to  the 
speeches,  but  I  would  fain  hope  that  it  was  only  caused  by 
enforced  temperance.  I  called  to  mind  how)  a  year  or  two 
earlier,  a  French  Academician,  on  a  visit  to  Oxford,  had  burst 
into  the  house  of  one  of  my  friends,  and  in  a  parched  voice 
had  begged  for  a  glass  of  wine.  Some  was  given  him.  As 
soon  as  he  was  sufficiently  recovered  to  speak,  he  explained 
that  he  had  been  dining  with  a  great  scholar  but  a  rigid  teeto- 
taler. It  was,  he  said,  the  first  time  within  his  memory  that 
he  had  taken  his  dinner  without  wine  or  beer,  and  he  felt 
well-nigh  suffocated.  At  the  Harvard  Commencement,  the 
victory  of  the  friends  of  temperance  is  not  even  yet  complete. 
As  night  draws  on  there  are  still  occasionally  some  remnants 
of  drunkenness  to  be  seen.  To  each  class  —  to  the  graduates, 
that  is  to  say,  of  each  year  —  a  room  is  assigned  in  the  Col- 
lege buildings,  where  old  friends  can  meet.  It  sometimes 
happens  that  a  wealthy  toper,  in  defiance  of  the  wishes  and 
even  of  the  votes  of  the  abstainers  who  often  form  a  majority, 
insists  on  providing  a  mighty  bowl  of  punch.  I  was  surprised 
to  learn  that  no  greatly  aggrieved  teetotaler  had  ever  been 
known,  in  his  righteous  indignation,  to  throw  into  the  mixture 
a  handful  of  salt.  The  Americans,  however,  are  a  patient 
people.  Harvard  punch-bowls,  nevertheless,  have  had  their 
day,  and  may  now  be  stowed  away  in  the  Archaeological 
Museum.  The  President  and  Fellows  have  this  year  voted, 
that  "hereafter  no  punches  nor  distilled  liquors  shall  be 
allowed  in  any  College  room  on  Class  Day  or  Commencement 
Day." 


92  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

When  I  considered  the  academic  temperance  of  the  place, 
the  impossibility  of  getting  wine  or  beer  in  the  great  Hall 
of  the  University,  I  was  astonished  at  the  daring  imagination 
of  the  Professor  of  Latin,  who,  when  a  great  German  scholar 
was  celebrating  last  year  the  fiftieth  anniversary  of  his  doc- 
torate, assured  him  in  a  telegram :  — 

"  Harvardiani  festo  gratantes  die 
Salutem  plenis  tibi  propinant  poculis." 

What  do  the  Harvardiani  know  of  full  cups  —  the  learned 
Harvardiani  I  mean,  not  the  dull  topers  who  each  Commence- 
ment flock  in  from  the  country?  But  the  Professor  has  the 
poet's  mind:  — 

"  And  as  imagination  bodies  forth 
The  forms  of  things  unknown,  the  poet's  pen 
Turns  them  to  shape,  and  gives  to  airy  nothing 
A  local  habitation  and  a  name." 

For  the  great  ceremony  of  Commencement,  we  assembled 
in  Massachusetts  Hall,  the  oldest  building  in  Harvard.  I 
was  first  taken  by  a  friend  to  the  gateway  to  watch  the  arrival 
of  His  Excellency  the  Governor  of  the  Commonwealth  of 
Massachusetts.  Alone  among  the  Governors  of  the  forty-two 
States  does  he  bear  this  title  of  Excellency.  He  drove  up 
in  an  open  carriage  drawn  by  four  horses,  himself  in  plain 
clothes,  but  accompanied  by  a  Staff,  in  their  scarlet  uniforms 
more  splendid  even  than  the  Deputy- Lieutenants  of  the  city 
of  London.  A  troop  of  Lancers  —  citizens  playing  at  sol- 
diers —  escorted  him.  His  train  was  swelled  by  the  chief 
officers  of  two  Russian  men-of-war.  It  so  happened  that  on 
a  point  overlooking  Boston  Harbour  the  statue  of  Admiral 
Farragut,  the  naval  hero  of  the  war  between  the  North  and 
South,  was  next  day  to  be  unveiled.  The  Czar,  once  more 


v.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  93 

eager  to  exhibit  his  Platonic  love  of  republics  and  liberty,  had 
sent  his  ships  to  add  to  the  display.  The  Lancers  halted 
outside  the  gates,  but  the  Staff  accompanied  the  Governor  as 
he  drove  in.  One  of  these  gorgeous  citizens,  anxious  for  the 
honour  of  Boston  and  Harvard,  and  unwilling  that  it  should 
be  thought  that  all  this  state  was  a  mere  passing  compliment 
to  the  foreign  naval  officers,  assured  them  that  every  year 
there  was  the  same  pomp.  As  they  entered  the  College 
grounds  there  was  indeed  an  unwonted  sight  for  the  subjects 
of  a  despot, —  a  great  crowd  and  not  a  single  soldier  or  police- 
man in  sight.  As,  led  by  a  brass  band,  we  slowly  marched 
in  a  long  procession  through  the  Yard  and  across  the  public 
road  beyond  to  Memorial  Hall,  the  throng  of  undergraduates 
and  strangers  opened  of  itself  to  let  us  pass,  lining  both  sides 
of  the  way.  At  certain  points,  where  there  was  any  "coign 
of  vantage  "  they  gathered  together  and  cheered  the  popular 
men  as  they  went  by.  The  Governor  seemed  a  great  favour- 
ite. Just  before  me  in  the  long  line  was  the  Rev.  Dr.  Everett 
Hale.  As  we  passed  the  thronged  steps  of  University  Hall, 
a  young  man  standing  at  the  foot,  and  looking  up  to  the 
undergraduates  massed  above  him,  cried  out  "  Hale ! "  and 
beat  time  for  the  "Harvard  yell,"  as  they  all  shouted:  Rah- 
rah-rah  ;  rah-rah-rah  ;  rah-rah-rahl  —  Hale,  or  rather, 
Ha-al,  for  they  prolonged  the  note.  Dr.  Hale  lifted  his  hat 
in  acknowledgment.  Just  beyond,  an  absurdly  drunken  fel- 
low bestowed  on  me  as  deep  and  as  formal  a  bow  as  his  un- 
steady legs  allowed.  He  meant  well  no  doubt,  and  it  was  a 
flattering  attention  to  a  stranger;  but  I  did  not  think  it  need- 
ful to  reply  to  the  compliment.  As  we  drew  near  Sanders 
Theatre  —  the  Harvard  Sheldonian  —  we  passed  between  the 
graduating  Bachelors  who,  in  cap  and  gown,  lined  both  sides 


94  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

of  the  way.  They  fell  in  at  the  end  of  the  procession.  In 
the  theatre  they  occupied  the  area,  and,  far  better  off  than  the 
Oxford  Masters  of  Arts  to  whom  the  same  place  is  assigned 
in  the  Sheldonian,  they  were  provided  with  benches. 

I  was  greatly  struck  by  the  difference  between  a  Harvard 
Commencement  and  an  Oxford  Commemoration.  In  both 
prize  compositions  are  recited,  and  in  both  honorary  degrees 
are  conferred.  But  here  the  resemblance  ceases.  At  Har- 
vard the  ordinary  degrees  are  also  given,  the  degrees  for  the 
whole  year.  In  Oxford,  it  is  the  distinguished  strangers 
alone  who  on  the  great  day  are  honoured.  Even  an  Oxonian 
Bishop,  who  in  that  capacity  is  at  once  made  a  Doctor  of 
Divinity,  is  not  thought  good  enough,  or  at  all  events  great 
enough,  for  Commemoration.  In  Oxford,  far  greater  pomp  is 
aimed  at,  but  owing  to  the  unrestrained  folly  of  the  under- 
graduates far  less  is  achieved.  Few  ceremonies  have  been 
contrived  with  greater  art.  To  the  triumphant  notes  of  the 
organ,  the  Vice-Chancellor,  preceded  by  the  Bedells  with 
their  silver  maces,  followed  by  the  Doctors  in  their  scarlet  or 
crimson  gowns  and  the  two  Proctors,  enter  the  Theatre  by 
the  great  doors,  which  on  this  day  alone  are  flung  open.  He 
takes  his  seat  in  his  chair  of  state,  with  the  Proctors  below 
him  and  the  Doctors  on  the  amphitheatre  around  him.  The 
names  of  those  who  are  to  be  honoured  that  day  are  one  by 
one  put  to  the  vote  of  the  House,  a  nominal  vote  it  is  true. 
"  Placetne  vobis  Domini  Doctores?  placetne  vobis,  Magistri  ?  " 
the  Vice-Chancellor  asks  in  each  case,  he  and  the  Proctors  as 
the  question  is  put  raising  their  caps,  which  they  alone  wear 
during  the  proceedings.  The  doors  are  a  second  time  thrown 
open,  and  the  Bedells  lead  in  a  second  procession,  composed 
of  those  who  are  to  receive  the  honorary  degrees,  each  wear- 


v.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  95 

ing  the  crimson  gown  of  a  Doctor  of  Laws.  The  Regius 
Professor  of  Civil  Law  takes  them  one  by  one  to  the  foot  of 
the  steps  which  lead  up  to  the  Vice-Chancellor's  chair,  and 
there,  in  a  Latin  speech,  proclaims  each  new  Doctor's  merits. 
Each  is  welcomed  by  the  Vice-Chancellor  with  a  grasp  of  the 
hand,  and  then  takes  his  seat  among  the  other  Doctors.  At 
my  first  Commemoration,  the  Chancellor  presided,  the  Earl 
of  Derby,  and  on  Alfred  Tennyson,  among  others,  an  honorary 
degree  was  conferred. 

All  the  solemnity  and  all  the  pomp  of  this  ancient  and  strik- 
ing ceremony  disappear  beneath  the  dull  buffoonery  of  the 
undergraduates,  and  the  incredible  weakness  of  the  Univer- 
sity. The  Regius  Professor's  voice  is  drowned  by  silly  out- 
cries, and  illustrious  strangers  are  honoured  —  if  honour  it 
can  be  called  —  in  the  midst  of  an  insulting  din.  "  Have  I 
done  anything  to  offend  them?  "  a  learned  foreigner  not  long 
ago  anxiously  asked,  when  the  speech  in  which  his  high  merits 
were  described  was  overwhelmed  by  the  uproar.  I  have  seen 
few  more  piteous  sights  than  one  I  witnessed  many  years  ago, 
when  an  aged  Vice-Chancellor,  repeatedly  raising  his  cap  to 
the  undergraduates  in  the  gallery,  with  beseeching  looks,  for 
his  voice  could  not  have  been  heard,  pleaded  for  silence,  but 
pleaded  in  vain.  His  humble  appeals  were  answered  with 
jeers  and  roars  of  laughter.  Men  who  could  thus  insult  vene- 
rable old  age  should  have  been  hooted  out  of  a  university.1 
How  different  was  the  scene  at  Harvard !  There  was  no  state, 
but  there  was  perfect  decorum  —  a  decorum  not  once  marred 
by  the  slightest  impropriety,  the  slightest  touch  of  rude- 
ness during  the  whole  of  the  proceedings.  Each  recipient  of 

1  The  Commemoration  of  the  present  year  was  conducted  with  far 
greater  decorum  than  any  I  have  witnessed. 


96  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

an  honorary  degree  rose  from  his  seat  as  his  name  was  read 
out  by  the  President,  who  in  a  few  words  in  Latin  sounded 
his  praises.  They  exchanged  bows,  and  the  newly-made 
Doctor  sat  down.  Applause  followed  in  each  case;  the 
louder,  of  course,  the  more  a  man  was  a  popular  favourite, 
but  in  no  case  was  it  prolonged.  A  little  more  ceremony 
would  not  have  been  out  of  place. 

Of  the  three  hundred  and  thirty-eight  students  who  took  the 
degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts,  only  a  few  of  the  most  distin- 
guished were  called  up  to  the  dais.  To  them  were  handed 
by  the  President  bundles  of  parchment  diplomas,  which  they 
distributed  among  their  comrades  seated  in  the  area.  Whilst 
this  distribution  was  quietly  going  on,  the  other  degrees  in 
Arts,  Divinity,  Law,  Medicine,  and  Science  were  conferred, 
the  recipients  coming  up  in  batches.  As  each  batch  presented 
itself,  the  President,  in  Latin  addressing  the  Governing  Body, 
stated  that  the  students  had  been  examined  and  approved- 
by  the  Professors,  and  like  the  Vice-Chancellor  at  Oxford, 
asked  for  their  Placet  for  conferring  the  degree. 

The  six  Bachelors  who  recited  the  prize-compositions  were 
perfect  in  their  memory;  there  was  not  in  any  one  of  them 
the  slightest  hesitation.  They  had  been  carefully  trained  in 
elocution.  They  spoke  slowly  and  clearly.  Their  action  — 
no  doubt  the  result  also  of  training  —  was  too  monotonous. 
There  was  a  movement  of  the  hand  so  unvaried  and  mechani- 
cal that  it  added  nothing  to  the  force  of  the  words.  Perfect 
rest  would  have  been  equally  effective.  They  did  not,  as  at 
Oxford,  speak  from  pulpits.  Each,  as  he  stepped  upon  the 
dais,  made  a  low  bow  to  the  President,  and  then,  turning 
round,  an  equally  low  bow  to  the  audience.  He  who  spoke 
the  Latin  oration  introduced  first  the  Governor  of  the  Com- 


v.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  97 

monwealth,  to  whom  he  bowed,  and  next  the  President  of  the 
University.  On  each  successive  Governor  an  honorary  degree 
had  for  so  many  years  been  conferred,  that  it  came  to  be 
regarded  as  an  established  custom.  When,  however,  Massa- 
chusetts disgraced  herself  by  the  election  of  the  notorious  Gen- 
eral Butler,  Harvard  refused  to  be  dragged  through  the  mire. 
That  year  the  Governor  was  passed  over. 

Inside  the  Theatre  as  well  as  outside,  there  was  something 
in  the  way  of  surprise  for  the  Russian  officers.  One  of  the 
young  orators  was,  beyond  all  manner  of  doubt,  a  Jew  by  race 
—  a  Jew,  moreover,  from  the  east  of  Europe.  Here  he  was 
no  outcast,  but  one  of  the  chosen  people,  one  of  "  the  happy 
few  "  on  whom  high  honour  was  conferred.  Another  boldly 
maintained,  in  defiance  of  truth,  censors,  and  the  Czar  of  all  the 
Russias,  that  "  the  eternal  and  inalienable  rights  of  man  are 
asserted  everywhere."  A  third  attacked  the  Government  of 
his  country.  "Out  of  the  present  political  corruption,"  he 
said,  "good  men  have  given  up  the  field."  No  such  speech 
as  that,  I  thought  to  myself,  is  happily  ever  heard  in  Eng- 
land. The  young  orator  insisted  on  their  duty  to  return  to 
the  strife,  and  to  make  political  life  once  more  wholesome 
and  pure. 

In  Oxford,  at  the  close  of  the  ceremony,  a  lunch  is  given  to 
the  newly-made  Doctors  and  to  the  most  important  people  in 
the  University,  in  the  noble  Library  of  All  Souls'  College. 
With  a  far  less  splendid  meal,  the  guests  of  the  day  are  wel- 
comed at  Harvard.  The  dinner  is  not  under  the  management 
of  the  University,  but  of  the  Association  of  Alumni.  Judge 
Story,  who  was  its  founder,  had  been  shocked  by  the  petty 
jealousies  which  so  often  kept  men  apart  who  had  been  bred 
in  the  same  college.  He  hoped  to  do  something  towards 


98  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

bringing  them  nearer  to  one  another  by  an  association  to 
which  every  Harvard  man  should  be  freely  admitted.  In  the 
address  which  he  delivered,  in  1842,  at  the  first  gathering  he 
said:  "We  meet  for  peace  and  for  union;  to  devote  one  day 
in  the  year  to  academical  intercourse  and  the  amenities  of 
scholars." x  Every  year,  on  Commencement  Day,  the  Alumni 
elect  their  President  for  the  next  year,  whose  chief  duty  it  is 
to  preside  at  the  annual  dinner.  This  gathering  of  graduates 
is  far  beyond  anything  known  in  an  English  university.  It  is 
not  to  witness  Commencement  that  most  of  them  come,  for 
it  is  by  the  friends  of  the  youthful  Bachelors  and  by  strangers 
that  the  Theatre  is  mainly  thronged.  The  former  members 
of  the  University  flock  to  Harvard  from  all  parts  of  the  coun- 
try, not  only  to  meet  their  old  comrades,  in  accordance  with 
a  time-honoured  custom,  but  also  to  vote  at  the  election  of  the 
Overseers.  Of  the  eighteen  thousand  men  who  have  gradu- 
ated in  the  last  two  centuries  and  a  half,  more  than  one-half, 
it  is  believed,  are  still  living.  Of  these,  from  one  in  ten  to 
nearly  one  in  seven  vote  each  year.2  As  proxies  are  not 
allowed,  the  attendance  is  very  large. 

An  attempt  has  recently  been  made  to  extend  the  suffrage, 
which  at  present  is  confined  to  graduates  in  Arts  and  the 
holders  of  honorary  degrees.  "It  was  not  so  much,"  it  is 
said,  "the  naked  right  to  vote  that  was  sought,  as  recognition 
at  Commencement,  and  a  right  to  partake  of  the  hospitalities 
of  the  College,  and  participate  in  the  enthusiasm  of  the  occa- 
sion."8 It  seems  strange  that  to  all  who  have  a  Harvard 
degree,  this  recognition  should  not  be  freely  extended,  and 

1  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  II.  426. 

2  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  4;  Harvard  Graduates'  Maga- 
zine, January,  1893,  P-  2^9- 


v.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  99 

this  right  should  not  be  willingly  granted.  The  Medical 
School,  however,  is  so  loosely  connected  with  the  old  foun- 
dation, that  it  can  scarcely  share  in  its  spirit.  Having  its 
seat  three  miles  away  in  Boston,  it  has  no  part  in  the  aca- 
demical life  and  in  the  social  feeling.  In  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge there  is,  happily,  no  similar  local  separation  of  the 
students.  Whatever  may  be  their  studies,  they  are  all,  not 
only  in  name  but  in  reality,  members  of  the  same  univer- 
sity. They  almost  all  belong  to  one  or  other  of  the  colleges. 
To  complete  their  education  our  young  physicians  and  sur- 
geons must,  no  doubt,  go  up  to  London;  for  in  the  small 
hospital  of  a  country  town  the  "  many  shapes  of  death  "  and 
disease  cannot  be  thoroughly  studied.  It  is  a  pity  that  in  the 
American  university  all  the  preliminary  scientific  instruction, 
all  the  instruction  which  can  be  given  outside  a  hospital,  is 
not  given  at  Harvard.  It  would  confer  a  double  benefit  —  a 
benefit  on  those  who  study  Medicine  and  on  those  who  study 
Arts;  for  the  mingling  of  men  and  studies  is  the  very  essence 
of  the  training  of  a  university.  The  graduates  of  the  Law 
School,  however,  are  not  under  the  same  disadvantage.  To 
them,  for  three  long  years,  the  Yard  had  been  their  pacing- 
ground.  They  "ranged  that  enclosure  old"  no  less  than  the 
students  in  Arts.  Nevertheless,  I  am  told  that  on  the  hearts 
of  those  who,  before  coming  to  Harvard,  had  passed  through 
some  other  university,  their  first  Alma  Mater  generally  retains 
by  far  the  stronger  hold.  It  might  be  otherwise  were  they 
not  only  allowed,  but  even  urged,  to  share  in  "  the  enthusi- 
asm of  the  occasion."  Then  as  the  year  came  round,  they 
would  help  to  swell  the  throng  which  from  North,  South,  and 
West,  from  the  Canadian  borders,  from  the  pleasant  shores  of 
the  far-distant  Pacific,  and  from  the  wilds  of  "  vast,  illimita- 


100  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

ble  Texas  "  gathers  in  Fair  Harvard,  "  the  home  of  their  free- 
roving  years." 

When  the  writer  whom  I  have  quoted  above  talks  of  "  the 
right  to  partake  in  the  hospitalities  of  the  College,"  he  must 
use  the  term  hospitalities  somewhat  loosely.  It  could  scarcely 
be  expected  that  the  Corporation  should  each  year  feed  a 
thousand  self-invited  guests.  Each  alumnus  pays  for  his  own 
dinner.  The  charge,  viewed  in  the  abstract,  seems  moderate 
enough  —  only  a  dollar.  As  two  o'clock,  the  hour  for  the 
repast,  drew  near,  we  were  for  the  second  time  that  day 
formed  in  procession  in  the  Yard.  At  the  head  came  the 
President  of  the  Association  and  the  guests,  and  next  the 
graduates  according  to  their  standing.  They  were  summoned 
in  their  Classes.  Classes  and  the  strong  Class  spirit  which 
springs  from  them,  so  familiar  a  feature  of  American  univer- 
sities, are  unknown  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  Even  at 
Harvard,  firmly  as  this  comradeship  binds  together  the  oldef 
men,  among  the  younger  generations  it  is  dying  out.  "There 
is  no  Class  spirit  at  Harvard,"  a  young  writer  says  sadly;  "the 
elective  system  destroyed  that  long  ago."1  Much  of  this 
spirit  was  bad,  and  has  deservedly  perished.  "The  different 
Classes,"  wrote  Judge  Story,  speaking  of  his  undergraduate 
days,  "were  almost  strangers  to  each  other,  and  cold  reserve 
generally  prevailed  between  them."2 

Just  as  in  the  ancient  English  universities,  when  any  mem- 
ber of  it  is  mentioned,  the  question  is  commonly  put,  "What 
is  his  College?"  so  in  an  American  university  it  is  asked, 
"What  is  his  Class?  "  The  course  of  instruction  spreads  over 
four  years,  and  the  undergraduates  are  ranged  in  four  divi- 
sions, Freshmen,  Sophomores,  Junior  Sophisters  or  Juniors, 

1  The  Crimson,  June  23,  1893.  2  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  I.  49. 


v.  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  101 

and  Senior  Sophisters  or  Seniors.  Each  of  these  divisions, 
furthermore,  is  known  as  the  Class  of  such  a  year;  not  of  the 
year  in  which  it  begins  its  studies,  but  of  that  in  which  it  is 
to  bring  them  to  a  close.  For  instance,  at  the  beginning  of 
the  academic  year  in  September,  1893,  there  were  in  resi- 
dence the  Classes  of  1894,  1895,  1896,  1897.  The  Seniors 
form  the  Class  of  1894,  for  it  is  in  that  year  that  they  are  to 
graduate.  The  Juniors  form  the  Class  of  1895;  the  Sopho- 
mores, of  1896;  and  the  Freshmen,  of  1897.  In  the  old  days, 
the  members  of  each  Class,  all  following  the  same  course  of 
instruction  under  the  same  tutors,  being,  moreover,  compara- 
tively few  in  number, by  the  end  of  their  four  years,  if  they  had 
not  all  become  intimate,  had,  at  all  events,  each  acquired  a 
more  or  less  accurate  knowledge  of  the  character  of  every  one 
of  his  companions.  As,  in  all  the  anxious  timidity  of  a 
Freshman,  they  had  on  the  same  day  entered  College,  so  on 
the  same  day,  in  all  "the  towering  confidence  "  of  a  Bachelor 
of  Arts,  had  they  bidden  it  farewell.  Every  year,  as  Com- 
mencement has  come  round,  have  they  revived  the  old  inti- 
macy and  kept  the  old  bond  from  loosening.  Not  only  do  they 
meet  in  Harvard,  but  in  Boston  also  they  often  have  their 
annual  dinner.  So,  too,  do  many  of  the  colleges  of  Oxford 
and  Cambridge  have  theirs  in  London.  But  in  these  meet- 
ings of  the  American  university,  there  is  this  touching  differ- 
ence. Each  year  the  band  grows  smaller  and  smaller  as 
classmate  after  classmate  passes  away.  There  is  no  fresh 
swarm  of  young  men  to  fill  up  the  gaps  left  by  the  veterans. 
In  the  Harvard  Graduates'  Magazine  for  January,  1893, 
eight  or  nine  pages  are  given  to  News  from  the  Classes.  The 
Rev.  Samuel  May,  one  of  the  last  survivors  of  that  gallant 
band  of  which  William  Lloyd  Garrison  was  the  leader,  sends 


102  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

in  his  report  as  Secretary  of  the  Class  of  1829.  "There  is 
little,"  he  writes,  "that  a  Class  of  five  men,  all  past  the  age 
of  eighty  years,  can  have  to  report  of  doings.  Yet,  when  that 
five  includes  such  names  as  Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  and  Sam- 
uel Francis  Smith,  it  will  be  admitted  that  it  is  not  altogether, 
even  now,  an  idle  class.  The  'national  song,'  written  by 
the  latter,  has  just  been  sung  in  union  by  tens  of  millions  of 
voices  and  hearts  at  the  national  and  patriotic  commemora- 
tion of  the  four-hundredth  Columbus  Anniversary."  Dr.  S.  F. 
Smith  is  the  author  also  of  America,  which  sixty-two  years 
ago  he  struck  off  in  half  an  hour  to  the  tune  of  God  Save  the 
King.  "I  had  no  idea,"  he  says,  "that  I  was  writing  a 
national  hymn."  On  the  eighty-third  birthday  of  his  old 
classmate,  Dr.  Holmes,  he  wrote,  as  Mr.  May  tells  us,  to  one 
of  the  Boston  newspapers:  "We  have  but  one  Oliver  Wen- 
dell Holmes,  who  is  known  and  loved  everywhere  in  the 
English-speaking  world.  .  .  .  Sixty-three  years  out  of  coU 
lege!  The  famous  Class  dinners,  uninterrupted  in  annual 
recurrence  from  1828  to  1890,  have  been  discontinued  at  a 
public  hostelry;  but  Dr.  Holmes  opens  his  hospitable  doors 
and  spreads  his  table  annually  for  those  that  remain.  Three 
in  1891,  three  in  1892,  met  in  memory  of  the  past,  in  recog- 
nition of  the  present,  and  in  anticipation  of  the  future."  The 
Secretary  of  the  Class  of  1832  reports  that  there  were  only 
four  now  available  for  an  anniversary.  Of  the  four,  one  was 
the  Autocrat's  brother,  Mr.  John  Holmes,  "the  best  and  most 
delightful  of  men,"  as  Lowell  many  years  ago  described  him.1 
The  strength  of  this  Class  feeling  is  now  and  then  shown  in  a 
union  for  some  good  purpose.  Thus,  the  Class  of  1856  raised 
a  subscription  of  six  thousand  dollars  (^1226),  as  a  fund 

1  Letters  ofj.  R.  Lowell,  II.  173. 


v.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  103 

for  defraying  the  annual  publication  of  Hai~vard  Studies  in 
Classical  Philology,  while  the  Class  of  1857  put  up  a  window 
of  painted  glass  in  Memorial  Hall.1 

When  on  Commencement  Day  in  last  June,  the  procession 
began  to  form  in  the  Yard,  and  the  Marshal  called  out,  "  Class 
1826,"  there  was  great  cheering  as  a  solitary  old  man  stood 
forth.  How  much  that  old  man  had  seen!  When  he  left 
College,  there  still  survived  many  a  gray-headed  veteran  who 
had  fought  in  the  Revolutionary  War.  The  Autocrat  of  the 
Breakfast  Table  was  just  closing  his  Freshman's  year.  Motley, 
Sumner,  Wendell  Phillips,  Lowell,  Dana,  and  Theodore  Parker 
were  schoolboys.  He  was  soon  supported  by  a  veteran  of 
1827.  Of  the  next  three  years,  there  was  not  a  single  repre- 
sentative. From  1831  downwards  there  was  no  gap.  In  the 
Hall  the  alumni  sat  down  in  their  Classes,  so  that  comrade 
sat  by  comrade.  The  Rev.  Mr.  Pierce  records  of  the  dinner 
of  1829:  "I  set  the  tune,  St.  Martin's,  the  seventeenth  time 
to  the  LXXVIII  Psalm.  I  asked  the  President  how  much  of 
the  Psalm  we  should  sing.  Judge  Story  replied,  'Sing  it  all.' 
We  accordingly,  contrary  to  custom,  sang  it  through  without 
omitting  a  single  stanza.  It  was  remarked  that  the  singing 
was  never  better.  But  as  the  company  are  in  five  different 
rooms,  it  will  be  desirable  on  future  occasions  to  station  a 
person  in  each  room  to  receive  and  communicate  the  time."2 
To  go  through  the  whole  of  the  seventy-three  verses  of  this 
fine  psalm,  even  though  the  singers  were  all  in  one  great  hall, 
would  be  more  than  these  modern  days  would  patiently  bear. 
We  were  contented  with  singing  only  five.  As  I  thought  of 
the  old  settlement  of  the  Puritans,  and  of  their  noble  resolu- 

1  Harvard  Graduate?  Magazine,  January,  1893,  pp.  279>  322- 

2  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  p.  56. 


104  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

tion  that  whatever  dangers  and  hardships  they  themselves  had 
to  face,  their  children  should  not  grow  up  in  ignorance;  as  I 
called  to  mind  that  we  were  standing  on  the  very  spot  where 
they  had  founded  their  College,  these  verses  sung  by  a  thou- 
sand voices  of  their  descendants,  removed  from  them  by  two 
centuries  and  a  half,  seemed  to  me  unspeakably  touching :  — 

"  Give  ear,  ye  children  ;  to  my  law 

Devout  attention  lend; 
Let  the  instructions  of  my  mouth 
Deep  in  your  hearts  descend. 

"  My  tongue,  by  inspiration  taught, 

Shall  parables  unfold; 
Dark  oracles,  but  understood, 
And  own'd  for  truths  of  old : 

"  Which  we  from  sacred  registers 
Of  ancient  times  have  known; 
And  our  forefathers'  pious  care 

To  us  has  handed  down.  9 

"  Let  children  learn  the  mighty  deeds 

Which  God  perform'd  of  old; 
Which,  in  our  younger  years,  we  saw, 
And  which  our  fathers  told. 

"  Our  lips  shall  teach  them  to  our  sons, 

And  they  again  to  theirs; 
That  generations  yet  unborn 
May  teach  them  to  their  heirs." 

There  is  a  quaint  passage  in  old  Samuel  SewalPs  Diary, 
which  might  not  unfitly  be  read  aloud  at  every  Commence- 
ment in  grateful  commemoration  of  the  founder  of  the 
College.  On  January  26,  169^  he  recorded:  "I  lodged  at 
Charlestown  at  Mrs.  Shepards',  who  tells  me  Mr.  Harvard 
built  that  house.  I  lay  in  the  chamber  next  the  street.  As  I 
lay  awake  past  midnight,  In  my  Meditation  I  was  affected  to 


v.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  105 

consider  how  long  agoe  God  had  made  provision  for  my  com- 
fortable Lodging  that  night,  seeing  that  was  Mr.  Harvard's 
house :  And  that  led  me  to  think  of  Heaven  the  House  not 
made  with  hands,  which  God  for  many  Thousands  of  years  has 
been  storing  with  the  richest  furniture,  (saints  that  are  from 
time  to  time  placed  there),  and  that  I  had  some  hopes  of 
being  entertained  in  that  Magnificent  Palace,  every  way  fitted 
and  furnished.  These  thoughts  were  very  refreshing  to  me." l 
When  the  dinner  was  finished  the  jugs  of  coffee  were  again 
passed  down  the  tables,  and  cigars  and  pipes  were  lighted.  I 
was  surprised  to  see  how  few  smokers  there  were, —  not,  I 
think,  one-fourth  as  many  as  there  would  have  been  in  a  simi- 
lar company  in  England.  The  speeches  that  followed  were 
somewhat  disappointing.  As  a  stranger  remarked  to  me: 
"There  was  no  scholarship  in  any  one  of  them.  They  might 
all  have  been  made  by  men  not  educated  in  a  university." 
Had  they  been  spoken  by  the  representatives  whom  Oxford 
generally  sends  to  Parliament,  they  could  not  have  shown 
fewer  signs  of  the  scholar.  There  was  no  wit,  and  next  to 
no  humour.  Lowell  has  passed  away,  and  Holmes  was  not 
there.  The  President,  however,  spoke  well.  What  he  had 
to  say,  he  said  briefly  and  clearly.  His  was  a  speech 
which  would  have  more  than  satisfied  Carlyle.  Had  some 
of  the  Professors  been  called  on,  doubtless  an  academic 
flavour  would  have  been  given  to  the  meeting.  Mr.  Robert 
Lincoln,  the  son  of  the  great  President,  when  once  he  had 
shaken  himself  free  from  his  jokes,  was  vigorous  enough.  He 
defended  the  Judge  who  three  years  earlier  had  tried  the  Chi- 
cago anarchists  from  the  charges  lately  brought  against  him  by 
a  man  high  in  authority  in  the  State.  The  prolonged  applause 
with  which  Mr.  Lincoln  was  welcomed  bore  testimony  not 
1  Diary  of  Samuel  Sewall,  I.  447. 


106  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  v. 

only  to  his  own  worth,  but  also  to  the  deep  feeling  of  reve- 
rence with  which  his  father's  memory  is  cherished,  a  reverence, 
I  believe,  scarcely  less  than  that  felt  for  Washington. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  followed  by  a  Roman  Catholic  Bishop,  on 
whom  that  morning  had  been  conferred  the  degree  of  Doctor 
of  Laws.  He  took  for  the  subject  of  his  discourse  the  lecture 
which  Mr.  Huxley  had  lately  delivered  before  the  University 
of  Oxford.  For  a  full  half-hour  he  overwhelmed  him  and  us 
with  his  rhetoric.  He  told  an  audience  of  university  men 
the  whole  story  of  the  death  of  Socrates,  as  if  not  only  Plato, 
Xenophon,  Grote,  and  Jowett  were  unknown  to  everybody 
present,  but  even  Goldsmith's  History  of  Greece  were  a  sealed 
book.  It  was  amazing  to  me  how  this  rhetorical  sermon, 
delivered  after  dinner, —  a  teetotal  dinner,  it  is  true, —  was 
applauded  by  an  audience  of  university  men.  I  should  not 
forget,  however,  that  when  there  are  a  thousand  present,  if 
only  one  in  every  five  claps  his  hands  or  beats  the  table,  the 
tumult  is  considerable.  Americans,  I  thought,  must  have  an 
amazing  appetite  for  hortatory  rhetoric.  Scarcely  less  amaz- 
ing was  it  to  hear  in  this  "Godless  University"  a  Roman 
Catholic  Bishop  denounce  as  atheistical,  a  lecture  delivered 
in  the  very  home  and  centre  of  all  that  is  venerable  in  An- 
glican orthodoxy.  Oxford  the  culprit,  the  charge  impiety, 
the  accuser  a  Roman  Catholic  Bishop,  the  Court  a  Unitarian 
University,  the  verdict  Guilty !  I  called  to  mind  how,  some 
thirty  years  ago,  a  far  more  eloquent  Bishop,  at  the  meeting 
of  the  British  Association  at  Oxford,  had  scoffed  at  Darwin 
and  his  new  teaching,  and  how,  the  moment  he  sat  down  amid 
the  laughter  and  the  applause  of  his  audience,  Mr.  Huxley 
had  started  up  and  smitten  him  heavily.  I  wished  that  he 
had  been  at  Harvard  to  try  another  fall  with  another  Bishop. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Phi  Beta  Day.  — Foundation  of  the  Society.  — Emerson's  Oration  in  1837. 
—  Charles  Sumner.  —  The  Meeting  and  the  Dinner. 

ON  the  day  after  Commencement  I  attended  the  yearly 
meeting  of  the  Harvard  Chapter  of  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa. 
This  Society,  to  which  there  is  nothing  that  answers  in  England, 
took  its  rise  towards  the  close  of  last  century  in  William  and 
Mary  College,  Virginia.  It  aims  at  "  the  promotion  of  litera- 
ture and  friendly  intercourse  among  scholars."  The  Harvard 
Chapter  was  founded  in  1781,  by  virtue  of  an  instrument  called 
a  "  Charter  Party,"  dated  December  4,  1779,  formally  executed 
by  the  President,  officers,  and  members  of  the  original  Society, 
issued  to  Elisha  Parmele,  of  the  University  of  Cambridge,  Mas- 
sachusetts Bay,  authorizing  him  to  establish  a  Chapter  there, 
with  all  rights  and  powers.  Parmele,  no  doubt,  had  been 
initiated  in  Virginia.  For  many  years  the  Phi  Beta  was  every- 
where a  secret  Society,  with  a  formal  initiation,  of  an  oath  of 
secrecy,  and  certain  mysteries,  such  as  a  peculiar  way  of  shak- 
ing hands  and  of  knocking  at  the  door.  The  knock  was  an 
anapest  —  two  light  knocks  followed  by  one  hard.  The  name 
in  full,  3?L\oo-ocj>La  Biov  KvflcpvY)TY)<:  (Philosophy,  the  guide  of 
life) ,  was  kept  a  secret ;  the  Society  was  known  to  the  outside 
world  by  the  three  initial  letters.  I  do  not  know  whether  at 
any  time  any  connection  was  kept  up  between  the  Harvard 
Chapter  and  the  Mother  Society.  Charter  Party,  Johnson  de- 
fines as  a  paper  relating  to  a  contract,  of  which  each  party  has 

107 


108  HARVARD   COLLEGE. 


CHAP. 


a  copy.  Whatever  the  contract  was,  if  ever  there  was  one,  it 
has  long  ceased  to  be  enforced.  The  Harvard  Phi  Beta  is 
much  more  than  a  Chapter ;  it  is  a  Society  in  itself,  with  its 
own  independent  constitution  and  government,  and  with  scarcely 
any  connection  with  the  other  Chapters  but  in  name.  No  new 
Chapter,  however,  can  be  founded  without  the  consent  of  a  cer- 
tain number  of  the  older  Chapters.  When  in  the  same  State 
a  second  is  founded,  the  first  has  added  to  its  name  the  first 
letter  of  the  Greek  alphabet,  and  the  second,  the  second,  and 
so  on.  Thus,  the  Harvard  Chapter  is  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa, 
Alpha  of  Massachusetts.  In  all  alike  scholarship  is  made  the 
chief  ground  of  admittance.  The  Society  is  everywhere  re- 
garded with  jealousy  by  that  large  body  of  university  men  who 
have  not  been  able  to  win  their  way  into  it.  It  is  a  kind  of 
aristocracy  in  a  democratic  country.  Within  eight  years  of  its 
formation  "a  Committee  of  the  Overseers  reported  to  the 
Board  *  that  there  is  an  institution  in  the  University  with  the 
nature  of  which  the  Government  is  not  acquainted,  which  tends 
to  make  a  discrimination  among  the  students,'  and  submitted 
'  the  propriety  of  inquiring  into  its  nature  and  design.'  " l  The 
Chairman  of  this  Committee  was  that  "famous  rebel,"  John 
Hancock.  It  seems  strange  that  the  man  who  had  once  been 
the  President  of  the  Continental  Congress  which  published  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  should  now  be  troubling  his  head 
about  a  small  secret  society  got  up  by  a  knot  of  students. 

The  Phi  Beta  was  caught  in  the  great  wave  of  popular  rage 
against  Free  Masonry  which  swept  over  the  land  —  a  wave  in 
which  were  overwhelmed  Henry  Clay's  hopes  of  arriving  at  the 
Presidency  of  the  United  States.  There  was  not  a  secret 
society  that  was  not  attacked  as  opposed  to  the  spirit  of  de- 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  398. 


vi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  109 

mocracy.  In  1831  John  Quincy  Adams,  the  ex- President,  and 
Judge  Story,  after  a  long  and  angry  discussion,  induced  their 
"brethren  "  of  the  Harvard  Phi  Beta  to  throw  open  its  secrets 
to  the  world  —  to  throw  them  open  formally,  that  is  to  say,  for 
by  this  time  there  was  nothing  left  to  divulge.  Everybody 
knew  what  the  name  meant.  Everybody  could  give  the  Phi 
Beta  shake  of  the  hand  and  the  Phi  Beta  knock  at  the  door. 

For  about  forty  years  the  Harvard  Phi  Beta  was  a  College 
Society,  holding  frequent  meetings  in  men's  rooms,  where 
essays  and  poems  were  read.  Each  year  it  had  one  public 
performance  on  the  morning  after  Commencement  —  an  anni- 
versary always  known  as  Phi  Beta  Day.  As  time  went  on  the 
terminal  meetings  became  less  and  less  frequent,  till  they 
ceased  altogether,  while  the  annual  meeting  steadily  grew  in 
importance.  On  this  great  day  an  oration  is  delivered  and  an 
original  poem  is  recited.  At  first  the  Orators  and  Poets  were 
chosen  from  among  the  young  Bachelors  of  Arts.  In  1788 
John  Quincy  Adams,  the  year  after  he  had  taken  his  degree, 
gave  the  oration.  Gradually  older  men  were  selected,  while 
the  choice  was  not  confined  to  the  "  brethren."  At  the  pres- 
ent time,  when  on  the  "  bead-roll "  are  "  filed"  the  names  of 
men  eminent  by  genius,  scholarship,  and  literature,  or  by  the 
post  which  they  have  filled  in  the  world,  to  be  invited  to 
address  the  Society  is  a  mark  of  high  distinction.  The  Presi- 
dent, that  eminent  Greek  scholar,  Professor  Goodwin,  in  an 
address  which  he  delivered  before  it  in  1891,  speaking  of 
Harvard  said  :  "  The  Phi  Beta  is  the  only  society  whose  right 
to  examine  the  condition  of  our  scholarship  is  unquestioned. 
She  is  the  only  society  here  which  represents  College  scholar- 
ship pure  and  simple.  All  her  children  either  have  achieved 
distinction  for  scholarship  in  College,  or  have  shown  in  after 


110  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

life  that  they  might  have  achieved  it  if  they  had  wanted  to, 
or  if  the  College  had  let  them  distinguish  themselves  in  their 
own  way.  But  although  Phi  Beta  keeps  in  her  own  hands  the 
wholesome  power  of  correcting  the  mistakes  of  the  College 
authorities,  when  they  either  overlook  genius  or  allow  it  to 
blush  unseen,  she  still  accepts  without  question  the  body 
of  recruits  who  are  sent  to  her  each  year  as  '  distinguished 
scholars.'  " 1  Every  Phi  Beta  Day  a  certain  number  of  hono- 
rary members  are  elected.  It  is  then  that  "  the  mistakes  of 
the  College  authorities  "  are  corrected.  In  earlier  years  only 
sixteen  ordinary  members  were  admitted,  but  with  the  growth 
of  the  College  the  number  has  been  raised  to  twenty-five. 
The  election  is  curiously  contrived.  In  each  year  the  electors 
are  eight  in  number,  all  Seniors,  who  in  the  previous  year  had 
been  themselves  elected  from  the  Juniors,  not  only  to  act  as 
electors  next  year,  but  to  be  members  of  the  Society.  They 
had  been  chosen,  not  out  of  the  whole  body  of  Juniors,  but 
out  of  the  twelve  who  stood  highest  on  the  list  for  scholarship. 
From  among  the  twenty-five  who  stand  highest  in  their  own 
Class  they  now  choose  seventeen,  who,  added  to  themselves, 
form  the  twenty-five  new  members.  "  No  honour  that  Pres- 
cott  received  at  College,"  writes  his  biographer,  "  was  valued 
so  much  by  him,  or  had  been  so  much  an  object  of  his  ambi- 
tion, as  his  admission  to  the  Society  of  the  Phi  Beta  Kappa. 
As  the  selection  was  made  by  the  undergraduates  themselves, 
and  as  a  single  black-ball  excluded  the  candidate,  it  was  a  real 
distinction ;  and  Prescott  always  liked  to  stand  well  with  his 
fellows,  later  in  life,  no  less  than  in  youth."2  For  Motley, 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  I. 

2  Life  of  Prescott,  ed.  1864,  p.  24.     By  the  present  rule,  a  candidate 
must  obtain  a  three-fourths  vote. 


vi.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  Ill 

who  had  entered  Harvard  when  he  was  but  thirteen,  and  who 
"  did  not  aim  at  or  attain  a  high  College  rank,  the  rules  were 
stretched  so  as  to  include  him."  1  The  Society  was  indeed 
quick  to  detect  the  genius  of  his  bright  and  promising  youth. 
The  correction  generally  comes  many  years  later.  A  year 
earlier  Charles  Sumner  had  been  passed  over.  Though  he 
was  a  good  classical  scholar  and  of  wide  reading,  his  neglect 
of  mathematics  had  kept  him  down  in  his  Class.  Seven  years 
later  he  was  chosen  an  honorary  member. 2  Had  such  a 
society  existed  in  the  English  Cambridge,  Wordsworth  and 
Charles  Darwin  would  most  certainly  have  been  refused  admit- 
tance as  distinguished  scholars.  How  soon  the  poet's  genius 
would  have  been  discovered  it  is  not  easy  to  say;  probably 
not  till  many  years  after  he  had  written  his  great  Ode  on  the 
Intimations  of  Immortality.  The  naturalist  would  have  won 
the  honour  by  his  Voyage  of  the  Beagle.  In  like  manner  an 
Oxford  Phi  Beta  would  have  had  "  to  correct  the  mistakes  of 
the  University  authorities  "  by  the  admission  of  Mr.  Ruskin 
and  Mr.  William  Morris.  Landor,  Shelley,  Sir  Edward  Burne- 
Jones,  and  Mr.  Swinburne  would  also  have  had  to  be  admitted ; 
but  as  they  all  left  without  taking  a  degree,  in  their  cases  it 
cannot  be  said  that,  so  far  as  examinations  went,  any  mistake 
was  committed. 

George  Ticknor  describes  a  dinner  in  1823  at  which  the  chief 
guest  was  Chancellor  Kent,  "  superannuated  by  the  Constitution 
of  the  State  of  New  York,  because  he  is  above  sixty  years  old, 
and  yet,  de  facto,  in  the  very  flush  and  vigour  of  his  extraordinary 
faculties."  Judge  Story  and  Daniel  Webster  were  present. 
"  Story  gave  as  a  toast,  '  The  State  of  New  York,  where  the 

!y.  L.  Motley,  by  O.  W.  Holmes,  1889,  p.  15. 
2  Life  of  Charles  Sumner,  I.  55. 


112  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

law  of  the  land  has  been  so  ably  administered  that  it  has  become 
the  land  of  the  law/  to  which  the  Chancellor  instantly  replied, 
'  The  State  of  Massachusetts,  the  land  of  Story  as  well  as  of 
song  ' ;  and  so  it  was  kept  up  for  three  or  four  hours,  not  a  soul 
leaving  the  table.  It  was  the  finest  literary  festival  I  ever  wit- 
nessed."1 

In  1834  Emerson  was  the  Poet,  and  in  1837  the  Orator. 
"  This  grand  oration,"  writes  Dr.  Holmes,  "  was  our  intellectual 
Declaration  of  Independence.  No  listener  ever  forgot  that 
address,  and  among  all  the  noble  utterances  of  the  speaker  it 
may  be  questioned  if  one  ever  contained  more  truth  in  language 
more  like  that  of  immediate  inspiration." 2  "  His  oration," 
said  Lowell,  "  was  an  event  without  any  former  parallel  in  our 
literary  annals,  a  scene  to  be  always  treasured  in  the  memory 
for  its  picturesqueness  and  its  inspiration.  What  crowded  and 
breathless  aisles,  what  windows  clustering  with  eager  heads, 
what  enthusiasm  of  approach,  what  grim  silence  of  foregone 
dissent !  It  was  our  Yankee  version  of  a  lecture  by  Abelard, 
our  Harvard  parallel  to  the  last  public  appearance  of  Schelling." 
Lowell  was  an  undergraduate  when  he  witnessed  this  scene,  and 
"  not  yet  among  the  '  Transcendentalists.'  "  A  year  later  his 
Class  Day  Poem  shows  "  that  he  was  untouched  by  the  new 
intellectual  spirit,  of  which  Emerson's  was  the  clearest  voice."  8 
"  Lighten  their  darkness  and  ours  too,"  some  must  have  ex- 
claimed, if  the  other  voices  were  all  less  clear  than  Emerson's. 
Perhaps  among  the  audience  was  the  great  advocate,  Jeremiah 
Mason,  who  gave  Webster  his  first  lesson  in  the  art  of 

1  Life  of  George  Ticknor,  I.  340. 
*R.  W.  Emerson,  by  O.  W.  Holmes,  1885,  p.  115. 
3  Literary  Essays,  by  J.   R.  Lowell,  1890,  I.  366;    Letters  of  J.  R. 
Lowell>  I.  31. 


vi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  113 

talking  to  a  jury.  Longfellow  records  how  a  few  months  after 
the  famous  Phi  Beta  Oration  some  one  "  asked  Mason  whether 
he  could  understand  Mr.  Emerson.  His  answer  was,  '  No,  I 
can't;  but  my  daughter  can.'"1  Longfellow  himself  a  little 
later  said  of  Emerson :  "  He  is  one  of  the  finest  lecturers  I 
ever  heard,  with  magnificent  passages  of  true  prose-poetry. 
But  it  is  all  dreamery,  after  all. "  2  If  Prescott  heard  the  Address, 
it  is  likely  that  he  was  one  of  those  who  listened  in  "  grim  silence 
of  foregone  dissent."  In  November,  1838,  he  wrote :  "I  have 
read  as  much  of  Carlyle's  French  Revolution  as  I  could  stand. 
His  views  certainly,  as  far  as  I  can  estimate  them,  are  trite 
enough.  And  in  short,  the  whole  thing  in  my  humble  opinion, 
both  as  to  forme  and  to  fond,  is  perfectly  contemptible."3  He 
who  despised  Carlyle  was  little  likely  to  esteem  Emerson.  An 
eminent  American  scholar,  writing  to  me  of  Emerson's  Oration 
and  of  his  Address  before  the  Divinity  College  in  the  following 
year,  says :  "  Nothing  shows  the  progress  of  thought  in  the 
last  sixty  years  more  than  the  undoubted  fact  that  these  two 
Addresses  were  laughed  at  and  even  vituperated  by  men  who 
still  live  to  be  ashamed  of  themselves." 

In  1846  the  Orator  was  Charles  Sumner.  In  a  blue  dress- 
coat  with  gilt  buttons,  buff  waistcoat,  white  trousers  and  gaiters 
—  "a  new  Demosthenes,  or  Cicero,  even  like  a  Grecian  god  as 
he  stood  on  the  platform  "  —  so  he  seemed  to  a  young  lady  in 
the  audience  —  for  two  hours,  without  the  aid  of  a  single  note, 
he  poured  forth  in  defence  of  peace  and  liberty  his  stream  of 
learned  but  far  too  copious  oratory.  "  A  grand,  elevated,  elo- 
quent oration  from  Sumner,"  Longfellow  recorded  in  his  Diary. 
"  He  spoke  it  with  great  ease  and  elegance ;  and  was  from 

1  Life  ofH.  W.  Longfellow,  I.  277.  2  Ib.  I.  301. 

8  Life  of  W.  H.  Prescott,  p.  339. 


114  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

beginning  to  end  triumphant."1  Even  Edward  Everett  was 
carried  away  by  the  young  speaker's  enthusiasm.  "  He  said," 
as  Professor  Felton  wrote  to  Sumner,  "  that  it  was  an  amazingly 
splendid  affair.  '  I  never  heard  it  surpassed.  I  don't  know 
that  I  ever  heard  it  equalled.'  Now,  Charley  (Felton  con- 
tinued), you  may  well  be  proud  of  having  drawn  forth  from 
these  stony  lips  such  human  tones  of  speech."  The  vener- 
able ex-President  of  the  United  States,  John  Quincy  Adams, 
who  attended  the  Society  for  the  last  time,  —  he  was  in 
his  eightieth  year,  —  thinking  how  his  part  was  nearly  played  in 
the  struggle  for  the  freedom  of  the  slave,  said  to  the  Orator  :  "  I 
look  from  Pisgah  to  the  Promised  Land  ;  you  must  enter  upon 
it."  2 

A  curious  fact  is  recorded  of  the  poem  which,  under  the  title 
of  Reveille,  was  recited  before  the  Society  in  the  summer  fol- 
lowing the  revolt  of  the  Southern  States.  "  It  was  reprinted  in 
the  South  during  the  war,  with  such  changes  as  made  it  serve ' 
the  Confederate  cause.  It  was  afterwards  reprinted  in  England 
as  evidence  of  the  spirit  which  animated  the  Confederacy." 3 

Ticknor,  writing  in  1863,  and  looking  back  fifty  years,  says  : 
"  The  3>  B  K,  it  should  be  remembered,  was  at  that  period  a 
Society  of  much  more  dignity  and  consequence  than  it  is  now. 
It  had  an  annual  public  exhibition,  largely  attended  by  such 
graduates  as  were  its  members,  and  indeed,  by  the  more  culti- 
vated portion  of  the  community  generally." 4  He  must  surely 
have  had  something  of  the  old  man's  failing  in  the  slight  which 
he  thus  cast  on  modern  days,  and  something,  moreover,  of  the 

1  Life  ofH.   W.  Longfellow,  II.  55. 

2  Life  of  Charles  Sumner,  III.  15-20. 

8  Library  of  Harvard  University:  Bibliographical  Contributions,  No. 
42,  by  W.  H.  Tillinghast,  p.  7. 
*  Life  of  W.  H.  Prescott,  p.  24. 


vi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  115 

old  man's  ignorance  of  what  was  going  on  almost  under  his 
very  nose.  At  all  events,  if  the  Society  was  for  a  brief  period 
under  an  eclipse,  it  soon  shone  forth  in  all  its  brightness.  Be- 
tween 1860  and  1880  it  numbered  among  its  Presidents,  Vice- 
Presidents,  Orators,  and  Poets,  Emerson,  Sumner,  Dana,  Lowell, 
Holmes,  G.  W.  Curtis,  and  Bret  Harte.  Lowell,  who  was  Presi- 
dent from  1863  to  1871,  describes  how,  in  1865,  he  had  sat  up 
late  the  night  before  Phi  Beta  Day  with  a  few  friends  who  had 
been  with  him  at  the  Commencement  dinner.  "  Per  Bacco 
and  tobacco,  how  wisely  silly  we  were  !  I  forgot  for  a  few 
blessed  hours  that  I  was  a  Professor,  and  felt  as  if  I  were  some- 
thing real.  But  Phi  Beta  came  next  day,  and  wasn't  I  tired  ? 
Presiding  from  9  A.M.  till  6.30  P.M.  is  no  joke  !  Ml  He  had  de- 
tected a  certain  sameness  in  the  inspiration  of  the  Poets  of  the 
Society.  In  a  letter  to  Professor  Child  he  says :  "  I  have 
noticed  that  Class  and  Phi  Beta  poems  almost  always  begin 
with  an  '  as  '  —  at  any  rate  they  used  to  in  my  time,  before  a 
certain  Boylston  Professor  took  'em  in  hand.2  E.g.  — 

As  the  last  splendours  of  expiring  day 

Round  Stoughton's  chimneys  cast  a  lingering  ray, 

So  — 

And  sometimes  there  was  a  whole  flight  of  '  as-es '  leading 
up  to  the  landing  of  a  final  so,  where  one  could  take  breath  and 
reflect  on  what  he  had  gone  through."3 

In  1867  Emerson  was  for  the  second  time  appointed  Orator. 
"  His  oration,"  wrote  Lowell,  "  was  more  disjointed  than  usual, 
even  with  him.  It  began  nowhere  and  ended  everywhere,  and 

1  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  I.  389. 

2  Professor  Child  was  at  that  time  the  Boylston  Professor  of  Rhetoric 
and  Oratory  at  Harvard. 

3  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  II.  237. 


116  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

yet,  as  always  with  that  divine  man,  it  left  you  feeling  that 
something  beautiful  had  passed  that  way  —  something  more 
beautiful  than  anything  else,  and  like  the  rising  and  setting  of 
stars.  Every  possible  criticism  might  have  been  made  on  it 
but  one  —  that  it  was  not  noble.  There  was  a  tone  in  it  that 
awakened  all  elevating  associations.  He  boggled,  he  lost  his 
place,  he  had  to  put  on  his  glasses,  but  it  was  as  if  a  creature 
from  some  fairer  world  had  lost  his  way  in  our  fogs,  and  it  was 
our  fault,  not  his.  It  was  chaotic,  but  it  was  all  such  stuff  as 
stars  are  made  of,  and  you  couldn't  help  feeling  that,  if  you 
waited  awhile,  all  that  was  nebulous  would  be  whirled  into 
planets,  and  would  assume  the  mathematical  gravity  of  system. 
All  through  it  I  felt  something  in  me  that  cried, '  Ha,  ha,  to  the 
sound  of  the  trumpets.'  " 

In  1 88 1  the  Society  celebrated  the  hundredth  anniversary  of 
its  foundation.  Delegates  were  present  from  all  parts  of  the 
country,  each  representing  a  Chapter  of  the  Phi  Beta.  Th» 
Orator  was  Wendell  Phillips.  It  was  his  last  great  speech  and 
was  worthy  of  the  occasion.  He  took  for  his  subject  the 
Cowardice  of  Educated  Men. 

Though  the  Phi  Beta  is  not  a  part  of  the  University,  is  in  no- 
wise under  its  government,  and  is  not  even  mentioned  in  the 
Catalogue,  nevertheless  it  is  recognized  by  the  College  authori- 
ties. It  is  in  the  University  Theatre  that  the  Oration  is  deliv- 
ered and  the  Poems  recited,  and  in  Massachusetts  Hall  that  the 
dinner  is  held.  In  the  Yard  the  procession  is  formed  in  which 
the  Orator  and  Poet  are  conducted  to  the  Theatre.  I  did  not 
discover  so  much  state  as  I  had  seen  on  Commencement  Day. 
Gowns  were  not  worn  and  there  was  no  Governor  of  the  Com- 
monwealth with  his  gorgeous  Staff.  Nevertheless  there  was  a 
long  and  imposing  line,  and  what  was  wanting  in  show  was,  no 


vi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  117 

doubt,  made  up  in  intellect.  The  guests,  instead  of  being  in 
front  as  on  the  day  before,  now  brought  up  the  rear.  Last  of 
all  came  the  President  of  the  Society,  with  the  Orator,  General 
Walker,  who  is  renowned,  not  only  as  a  soldier  who  did  good  ser- 
vice in  the  war  with  the  Southern  States,  but  also  as  a  Political 
Economist.  He  is,  moreover,  President  of  the  Boston  School  of 
Technology.  In  front  of  them  walked  the  Poet,  Mr.  Maurice 
Thompson,  accompanied  by  the  Roman  Catholic  Bishop.  The 
last  time,  perhaps,  that  the  Orator  and  Poet  had  met  was  face  to 
face  on  some  battle-field  in  the  Civil  War,  for  Mr.  Thompson,  too, 
had  played  his  part  in  it  in  the  army  of  the  South.  In  the  The- 
atre, the  President  of  the  University,  who  had  walked  with  the 
guests,  took  his  place  in  the  area  among  the  ordinary  members. 
The  roomy  dais  was  occupied  by  the  President  and  Chaplain 
of  the  Society,  the  Orator  and  the  Poet.  They  looked  some- 
what forlorn  in  the  midst  of  so  large  and  vacant  a  space.  They 
should  have  had,  by  way  of  support,  all  the  past  Orators,  Poets, 
and  Chaplains  who  could  be  got  together.  Doubtless  there 
were  not  a  few  of  them  in  the  audience.  The  Chaplain,  who 
ought  to  have  opened  the  proceedings  with  a  prayer,  through 
the  forgetfulness  of  the  President,  was  not  called  upon.  How- 
ever, the  prayer  was  not  lost,  for  the  venerable  man  gave  it  us 
by  way  of  grace  at  the  dinner,  and  a  very  good  prayer  it  was  — 
at  least  for  these  modern  days,  when  the  art  of  praying  seems 
well-nigh  forgotten.  As  a  grace  it  did  not  do  quite  so  well. 
The  oration  was  an  able  and  soldierly  defence  of  athleticism. 
There  were  some  high  in  authority  at  Harvard  who  thought 
that  in  a  university,  where  athleticism  seems  running  mad,  such 
a  defence  was  altogether  out  of  place.  They  maintained,  more- 
over, that  the  subject  was  ill-suited  for  a  learned  society.  The 
Poet  had  taken  for  his  theme  Lincoln's  grave.  In  his  verses 


118  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

he  let  his  hearers  know  that  he  had  fought  for  the  South.  He 
was,  he  said,  a  Georgian,  and  when  Georgia  had  called  him  he 
had  not  hesitated  to  obey.  Nevertheless,  avowed  and  impeni- 
tent rebel  that  he  was,  he  carried  his  audience  of  Northerners 
with  him  by  his  reverence  for  Lincoln.  He  sat  down  in  the 
midst  of  loud  applause,  which  seemed  to  me  his  due ;  though 
it  was  by  no  means  easy  to  judge  of  the  real  merits  of  a  poem 
that  was  recited  in  so  strange  a  scene.  My  thoughts  would 

wander  to 

"  Old,  unhappy  far-off  things 
And  battles  long  ago," 

as  I  contrasted  his  frail  body  with  the  General's  strong  and 
commanding  form,  and  thought  of  all  that  the  two  men  had 
done  and  undergone.  In  the  audience  was  many  a  man  who 
had  fought  in  the  Northern  armies ;  the  Theatre  in  which  we 
were  sitting  had  been  built  as  a  memorial  to  the  Harvard  men 
who  had  fallen  in  the  great  war ;  and  here,  in  this  very  spot,  in 
the  very  home  of  all  that  is  now  strongest  in  Northern  senti- 
ment and  conviction,  was  this  Southern  rebel  speaking  tenderly 
and  reverently  of  the  great  President,  and  touching  these  New 
Englanders  to  the  heart. 

In  more  than  one  way  did  this  Southerner  show  his  magna- 
nimity. He  had  this  great  audience  of  Northerners  at  his 
mercy  —  a  poet's  mercy;  and  nevertheless  he  was  brief.  His 
recitation  did  not  last  fifteen  minutes.  I  was  told  of  a  recent 
occasion  when  the  bard  had  six  times  paused  in  his  inspiration 
to  drink  iced  water,  and  only  paused  every  time  the  clock 
sounded  the  hour  or  the  quarters. 

We  sat  down  to  dinner  at  least  two  hundred  in  number ; 
all  the  members  ranged  according  to  their  seniority.  At  the 
high  table  were  the  President  of  the  Society,  the  Orator,  the 


vi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  119 

Poet,  and  the  guests.  The  President  of  the  University  sat 
among  his  old  comrades,  the  men  of  his  Class.  The  kindly 
Roman  Catholic  Bishop,  having  despatched  Mr.  Huxley  the 
day  before,  being  the  second  time  called  on  for  a  speech,  took 
nearly  half  an  hour  to  kill  him  again.  Perhaps,  however,  his 
discourse  should  rather  be  looked  upon  as  a  funeral  sermon, 
such  as  in  the  good  old  days  an  Inquisitor  might  have  preached 
over  the  ashes  of  a  heretic  whom  he  had  first  sent  to  the  stake. 
I  thought  regretfully  of  the  after-dinner  speech  which  Bishop 
Blougram  would  have  made,  if  indeed  that  Right  Reverend 
Prelate  would  have  been  capable  of  speaking  inspired  by  noth- 
ing stronger  than  iced  water  and  coffee. 

In  the  speech  which  I  was  called  on  to  make  I  brought  for- 
ward the  claims  of  my  own  University  to  a  share  in  the  great 
honour  of  founding  Harvard.-  It  was,  I  admitted,  to  Cam- 
bridge that  all  my  hearers  looked  up  as  their  ancient  Alma 
Mater.  To  Oxford,  however,  scarcely  less  gratitude  was  due. 
To  her  might  be  justly  applied  the  lines  which  the  poet  used  of 
the  great  English  statesman  :  — 

"  Nor  mourn  we  less  his  perished  worth 
Who  bade  the  conqueror  go  forth." 

Oxford  had  educated  Laud,  and  Laud  had  driven  the  Puri- 
tans across  the  seas.  When  all  the  orators  had  had  their  say 
the  whole  company  rose,  and  linking  hands  so  as  to  form  a  vast 
chain,  sang  Auld  Lang  Syne.  Thus  an  interesting  day  and  a 
pleasant  gathering  were  brought  to  a  close. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Class  Day.  —  Its  Origin  and  Growth.  —  Orators,  Poets,  and  Odists.  — 
The  New  England  Summer.  —  The  "  Spreads."  —  The  Exercises  at  the 
Tree. 

OF  the  three  great  days  of  Commencement  week  I  had 
seen  two.  I  had  seen  the  University  in  all  its  state 
conferring  honours  and  degrees,  and  I  had  seen  the  gathering 
of  a  Society  composed  of  the  most  distinguished  graduates. 
One  day,  and  by  no  means  the  least  curious  and  interesting  of 
the  three,  I  had  missed  seeing  through  the  inclemency  of  the 
weather.  The  festivities  of  Commencement  week  begin  with 
the  Seniors'  Class  Day  —  a  day  as  unlike  anything  we  have  in 
England  as  Phi  Beta  itself.  On  it  the  undergraduates,  or 
rather  the  Seniors,  reign  supreme.  The  Yard,  the  Theatre, 
Memorial  Hall,  I  might  almost  say  the  College  itself,  are  all 
under  their  rule.  It  is  the  first  but  the  great  day  of  the  Feast, 
"  the  greatest  day,"  according  to  The  Crimson,  "  in  a  Harvard 
student's  career."  "The  old-time  glory  of  Commencement," 
we  are  told,  "  has  departed."  To  a  stranger,  however,  a  good 
deal  of  it  seems  left.  Class  Day,  which  gathers  as  great  a 
crowd  of  the  young  and  happy  as  even  Eights'  Week  or 
Commemoration  at  Oxford,  has  taken  more  than  two  centuries 
to  attain  its  present  importance.  Almost  from  the  first  it  was 
the  custom  for  the  Seniors  each  year  to  choose  one  of  their 
number  who,  in  the  name  of  all,  should  take  leave  of  the 


CHAP.  vii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  121 

College  in  a  Valedictory  Oration  in  the  Latin  language.  Who 
but  the  philosophic  student  would  believe  that  out  of  this 
humble  beginning  could  have  sprung  all  the  gay  costumes,  the 
feastings,  the  dancing,  the  music,  the  illuminations,  and  the 
wildest  of  struggles?  In  somewhat  early  days  the  Valedictory 
was  accompanied  by  a  large  consumption  of  strong  liquors. 
In  1 760  each  Senior  brought  his  bottle  of  wine  to  the  meeting. 
Josiah  Quincy,  describing  a  dinner  some  seventy  years  ago, 
says :  "  Caleb  Gushing  came  in,  and  gave  for  a  toast,  '  The 
bands  of  friendship,  which  always  tighten  when  they  are  wet.' 
When  we  had  all  drunk  our  skins  full,  we  marched  round  to 
all  the  Professors'  houses,  danced  round  the  Rebellion  and 
Liberty  Trees,  and  then  returned  to  the  Hall.  A  great  many 
of  the  Class  were  half-seas  over."  *  In  1834  "  iced  punch  was 
brought  in  buckets.2  Colonel  T.  W.  Higginson  of  the  Class  of 
1841  "  can  remember  when  the  Senior  Class  assembled  annu- 
ally round  '  Liberty  Tree  '  on  Class  Day,  and  ladled  out  bowls 
of  punch  for  every  passer-by  ;  —  till  every  Cambridge  boy  saw 
a  dozen  men  in  various  stages  of  inebriation  about  the  College 
Yard." 3  Perhaps  the  Colonel  describes  not  the  scenes  of  his 
undergraduate  days  but  of  his  boyhood,  for  it  was  in  1838,  we 
are  told,  that  "  President  Quincy  encouraged  the  conversion  of 
the  Day  into  the  respectable  celebration  which  it  has  since 
been." 4  To  the  class  of  1838  "  Lowell,  and  the  sculptor  Story, 
and  other  congenial  souls  belonged."  To  them  the  main 
credit  of  this  conversion  has  been  given.5  Lowell's  influence, 

1  Figures  of  the  Past,  p.  49. 

2  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  by  W.  R.  Thayer,  p.  57. 
8  Harvard's  Better  Self,  by  W.  R.  Bigelow,  p.  7. 
4  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  p.  58. 

6  By  Henry  Ware,  in  Appletorfs  Journal  for  March,  1870;  quoted  in 
History  of  Higher  Education  in  Massachusetts,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  197. 


122  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

whatever  it  was,  must  have  been  exerted  from  a  distance,  for 
all  the  spring  and  summer  he  was  in  a  state  of  "suspension" 
some  miles  away.  His  neglect  of  his  prescribed  studies  —  a 
neglect  in  which  perhaps,  like  him  who  was  bidden  to  "  let 
Euclid  rest  and  Archimedes  pause,"  he  was  "  not  unwise  "  — 
had  been  visited  by  the  Harvard  form  of  rustication.  "  Suspen- 
sion," as  we  read  in  the  Catalogue,  "  is  a  separation  from  the 
University  for  a  fixed  period  of  time.  It  may  be  accompanied 
with  a  requirement  of  residence  in  a  specified  place,  and  of 
the  performance  of  specified  tasks."  Lowell  had  been  sent 
to  the  pleasant  village  of  Concord  "  to  carry  on  his  studies 
under  the  charge  of  the  Minister."  He  was  not  as  yet  an 
Emersonian,  or  he  might  have  sought  for  consolation  from  the 
Philosopher  of  Concord  under  the  disappointment  that  came 
upon  him.  Though  he  had  been  chosen  Class  Poet,  he  was 
not  allowed  to  be  present  to  read  his  poem  to  his  classmates. 
"  It  was  printed  for  their  use,  and  the  little  pamphlet,  his  first 
independently  printed  production,  has  become  one  of  the 
desiderata  of  bibliomaniacs."  * 

As  a  necessary  part  of  the  modern  refinements,  by  whomso- 
ever they  were  introduced,  the  friends  of  the  Seniors  were 
invited  to  the  ceremony.  Wine  and  punch  soon  fell  into  the 
background  as  sisters  and  cousins  came  to  the  front.  For  the 
ladies  elegant  collations  —  "Spreads,"  to  use  the  Harvard 
term  —  were  provided  by  the  wealthier  members  of  the  Class 
or  by  a  subscription.  There  was  dancing  in  the  open  air  in 
the  Yard  and  under  cover  in  the  Hall.  In  1846  Longfellow 
records  in  his  Journal:  "July  16,  Class  Day.  In  the  after- 
noon a  dance  in  Harvard  Hall ;  then  the  farewell  shouts  at  the 
doors  of  the  several  Colleges,  and  the  wild  ring  around  the  old 

1  Letters  ofj.  R.  Lowell,  I.  27,  31. 


vii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  123 

'Liberty  Tree.'"1  In  1850  the  following  account  was  writ- 
ten :  "  Cotillons  and  the  easier  dances  are  performed  in  the 
Yard,  but  the  sport  closes  in  the  Hall  with  the  Polka  and  other 
fashionable  steps.  The  Seniors  again  form,  and  make  the 
circuit  of  the  buildings,  great  and  small.  They  then  assemble 
under  the  Liberty  Tree,  around  which,  with  hands  joined,  they 
dance  after  singing  the  students'  adopted  song,  Auld  Lang 
Syne.  At  parting,  each  member  takes  a  sprig  or  a  flower  from 
the  beautiful  ' Wreath'  which  surrounds  the  ' farewell  tree,' 
which  is  sacredly  treasured  as  a  last  memento  of  College  scenes 
and  enjoyments."2  Adopted,  in  this  quotation,  must  be,  I 
think,  a  misprint  for  adapted,  for  Burns's  song  has  been  fitted 
to  Harvard  after  the  following  fashion  :  — 

"  Ye  rooms,  ye  halls,  ye  rough  old  bricks, 

Ye  trees,  ye  walks  of  mine  ! 
How  are  ye  hallowed  by  the  dreams 
Of '  auld  lang  syne.'  "  8 

Every  year  the  gathering  grows  larger  and  larger,  and  the 
"  Spreads  "  become  more  numerous  and  more  elaborate.  In 
the  Class  Day  Supplement  to  the  Harvard  Crimson,  I  found  a 
column  headed  :  "  A  List  of  the  men  who  will  spread,  with  the 
places  where  the  Spreads  will  be  given."  There  were  eighty- 
eight  hosts  in  all,  but  as  they  had  clubbed  together  in  smaller 
or  larger  groups,  there  were  only  fourteen  places  where  their 
hospitality  was  dispensed.  At  the  end  of  the  list  were  such 
announcements  as  the  following :  "  The  Pi  Eta  Spread  is  in 
the  Hemenway  Gymnasium  on  Friday  in  the  middle  of  the 
day."  "  The  Spread  in  Lower  Massachusetts  is  on  Friday  at  6. 

1  Life  ofH.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  50. 

'2  College  Words  and  Customs,  quoted  in  An  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  p.  58. 

8  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  672. 


124  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

After  the  Spread  the  hosts  will  receive  their  friends  in  their 
rooms."  So  extensive  have  become  the  preparations  that  "  the 
constant  services  of  a  hired  manager  are  required."  In  the 
early  part  of  the  century  it  was  often  on  Commencement  Day, 
and  not  on  Class  Day,  that  the  young  Bachelor  entertained  his 
friends.  When  Prescott  took  his  degree,  his  father,  proud  of 
his  son's  having  a  part  assigned  to  him  in  the  Exercises,  gave 
a  sumptuous  dinner  to  over  five  hundred  guests  in  a  great 
marquee.  The  day  ended  with  "dancing  and  frolicking  on 
the  green." l 

The  simple  ceremony  of  the  "  Valedictory  "  had  expanded 
on  more  sides  than  one.  To  the  Orator  a  Poet,  as  has  been 
seen,  had  been  added  ;  and  later  on  an  Odist,  an  Ivy  Orator, 
a  Chorister,  a  Hymnist,  and  a  Chaplain.  The  Chaplain,  the 
Hymnist,  the  Orator,  and  the  Odist  represented  the  sober  side 
of  life  ;  the  Poet  and  Ivy  Orator  its  humorous.  The  Ivy  Orator 
took  his  name  from  the  custom  that  once  prevailed  of  each 
Class  planting  an  ivy-shoot  on  Class  Day.  At  the  place  where 
it  was  put  into  the  ground,  he  delivered  his  oration ;  but  as 
the  plant  never  grew,  no  doubt  because  it  could  not  stand  the 
summer  heats,  so  the  custom  was  abandoned.  He  answers  to 
the  Tcrrce  Filius  of  the  Oxford  Commemoration  in  the  old 
days,  but  he  never  goes  to  the  lengths  on  which  that  gross, 
though  licensed,  buffoon  used  to  venture.  There  are  no  scurri- 
lous jests  uttered  by  him  against  the  President  and  the  Pro- 
fessors. About  the  beginning  of  the  present  century  the 
Orator  ventured  to  give  his  Valedictory  in  English.  This 
innovation  the  Faculty  resisted,  as  "  it  gives,"  to  quote  their 
words,  "  more  the  appearance  of  a  public  Exhibition  designed 
to  display  the  talents  of  the  Performers  and  entertain  a  mixed 

1  Life  of  IV.  H.  Prescott,  p.  25. 


vii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  125 

audience  than  of  a  merely  valedictory  address  of  the  Class  to 
the  Government,  and  taking  leave  of  the  Society  and  of  one 
another,  in  which  Adieu  Gentlemen  and  Ladies  from  abroad 
are  not  particularly  interested." *  In  the  end  the  Faculty  gave 
in,  as  Faculties  almost  always  do  give  in,  and  Latin  disappeared 
from  Class  Day.  The  Odist  composes  an  ode  to  be  sung  to 
the  tune  of  Fair  Harvard.  The  Chorister  had  to  write  the 
music  for  the  Class  Song  and  conduct  the  singing  at  the  Tree. 
For  the  Song,  by  a  vote  of  the  Class  of  1891,  Fair  Harvard  was 
substituted ;  so  that  one-half  of  the  Chorister's  task  has  been 
swept  away.  The  Chaplain  and  Hymnist  have  disappeared. 
The  management  of  the  day  is  under  the  control  of  a  Secretary, 
three  Marshals,  and  three  Committee-men.  Every  October, 
soon  after  the  beginning  of  the  Academic  Year,  the  Seniors 
meet  to  elect  their  Orators,  Poets,  and  the  rest.  Those  only 
have  votes  who  are  candidates  for  the  Bachelor's  degree  at  the 
next  Commencement.  The  voting  is  by  secret  ballot.  In  the 
list  of  the  Poets  are  found  the  names  of  Story  the  Jurist, 
Palfrey  and  Bancroft  the  historians,  Emerson,  Holmes  and 
Lowell.  It  is  more  by  chance  than  by  the  discernment  of  his 
classmates  that  Emerson  appears  in  this  goodly  company,  for 
he  was  not  chosen  till  seven  of  his  comrades  had  refused  to  be 
inspired.2  Among  the  Orators  less  distinguished  names  are 
found.  In  1846,  however,  Longfellow  recorded  in  his  Jour- 
nalz :  "Class  Day.  The  Oration  by  Child,  extremely  good; 
one  of  the  best  —  on  the  whole  the  best  —  I  have  heard  on 
such  occasions."  Child  is  Professor  F.  J.  Child,  the  learned 
editor  of  The  English  and  Scottish  Popular  Ballads.  On  the 

1  An  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  p.  57. 

2  R.   W.  Emerson,  by  O.  W.  Holmes,  p.  45. 
»  Life  ofH.   W.  Longfellow,  Vol.  II.  p.  50. 


126  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

publication  of  the  first  part  Lowell  wrote  to  him :  "  You 
have  really  built  an  imperishable  monument,  and  I  rejoice  as 
heartily  as  the  love  I  bear  you  gives  me  the  right  in  having 
lived  to  see  its  completion." l  A  few  years  ago  the  choice  of 
the  class  for  Orator  fell  on  a  negro,  in  whom  there  was  not  a 
drop  of  white  blood.  That  a  negro  can  be  a  fine  speaker  had 
been  shown  long  before  by  Frederick  Douglass.  Whether  this 
young  man  was  chosen  solely  for  his  merits  or  as  a  noble 
expression  of  sympathy  for  a  despised  race,  I  do  not  know. 
Perhaps  in  the  choice  there  was  a  touch  of  kindly  humour. 

The  Orators  and  Poets  of  1893  all  distinguished  themselves 
in  the  examinations.  To  two  of  them  parts  were  assigned  in 
the  exercises  at  Commencement.  In  the  Class  Day  election  the 
balance,  it  seems,  is  held  true  between  mind  and  body ;  the 
four  who  had  been  selected  for  their  gifts  of  oratory  and  poetry 
were  balanced  by  four  who  were  selected  for  their  services  in 
athletics.  The  Marshals  were  the  Captains  of  the  Baseball  and 
Football  Teams  and  of  the  Boat ;  the  Secretary  was  the  Man- 
ager of  the  Football  Eleven.2  The  three  Committee-men 
were,  no  doubt,  if  not  Orators,  Poets,  or  Athletes,  at  least 
good  fellows. 

The  greatest  day  in  a  Harvard  student's  career  is  surely  also 
the  longest  day.  On  rising,  he  puts  on  evening  dress,  and  he 
does  not  take  it  off  till  midnight,  and  often  till  long  after. 
There  is,  however,  for  a  brief  interval  an  easier  costume  worn 
by  those  who  take  part  in  the  exercises  at  the  Tree.  According 
to  the  old  custom,  to  the  evening  dress  a  tall  silk  hat  was  added, 
but  by  the  recent  vote  by  which  cap  and  gown  have  been  made 
part  of  the  costume  of  the  day,  the  hat  is  no  longer  needed. 

1  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  II.  304. 

2  Harvard  Graduates'  Magazine,  January,  1893,  P-  3°6- 


vil.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  127 

How  much  is  done  in  the  course  of  this  midsummer's  day  is 
shown  by  the  following  official  Programme  :  — 

"  9  A.M.  The  Senior  Class  will  assemble  in  front  of  Holworthy  and 
march  to  Appleton  Chapel,  where  prayer  will  be  offered  by  Rev.  William 
Lawrence,  S.T.D.1 

"  1 0.45 .  The  Senior  Class  will  assemble  in  front  of  Holworthy  and  march 
to  Sanders  Theatre. 

"  2  to  5  P.M.     Music  in  the  Yard. 

"  3  to  5.     Dancing  in  Memorial  Hall. 

"  5.  The  Senior  Class  will  assemble  in  front  of  Holworthy,  cheer  the 
College  buildings  and  march  to  the  Tree. 

"  8  to  ii.  Dancing  in  the  Gymnasium  and  Memorial  Hall.  Music  and 
Illumination  in  the  College  Yard. 

"  8.0.    The  Glee  Club  will  sing  in  front  of  Holworthy. 

"  9.0.  The  Banjo  Club  and  the  Mandolin  and  Guitar  Club  will  play  on 
the  Law  School  steps." 

Even  when  the  last  dance  has  come  to  an  end  and  the  last 
guest  has  left,  sleep,  I  am  told,  does  not  fall  upon  the  College. 
The  Seniors  spend  the  few  hours  of  night  in  talking  over  the 
stirring  doings  of  the  great  day  and  in  fond  memories  of  their 
student  life  now  so  rapidly  drawing  to  its  close. 

"  Et  jam  nox  humida  cselo 
Praecipitat,  suadentque  cadentia  sidera  somnos," 

"  Nature's  soft  nurse  "  bids,  but  bids  in  vain. 

The  weather,  which  I  am  told  almost  always  favours  Class 
Day,  this  year  showed  it  no  indulgence.  I  have  heard  Ameri- 
cans on  our  side  of  the  Atlantic  complain  of  the  changeable- 
ness  of  the  climate,  not  only  of  England,  but  of  Europe.  It 
was  a  disappointment  to  me  to  find  how  uncertain  a  New  Eng- 
land June  can  be.  There  was  a  variety  in  it  that  was  worthy 

1  Dr.    Lawrence  last  year  succeeded  Phillips    Brooks   as  Bishop  of 

Massachusetts. 


128  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

of  Cumberland  or  Devonshire.  On  the  afternoon  of  the  seventh 
of  the  month  the  thermometer  in  my  room  in  Cambridge 
stood  at  91,  though  the  Venetian  shutters  had  been  kept  closed. 
On  the  thirteenth,  at  a  little  village  on  the  sea-coast  we  were  all 
sitting  round  a  blazing  log  fire.  On  the  seventeenth  fires  were 
kept  burning  all  day.  On  the  twenty-fourth,  calling  at  two  houses 
in  Cambridge,  in  both  I  found  my  friends  sitting  round  the  fire. 
In  the  southern  parts  of  England  I  had  never  seen  a  fire  so  late 
in  the  summer,  and  yet  Boston  is  in  the  same  latitude  as  Rome. 
If  the  summer  is  late  in  coming  and  is  uncertain  even  when  it 
has  come,  in  the  clearness  of  the  air  and  the  blueness  of  the 
sea,  on  fine  days,  it  displays  the  charms  of  the  Mediterranean 
shore.  Hawthorne  was  disappointed  by  the  Italian  skies.  They 
were,  he  said,  what  he  had  been  used  to  all  his  life  in  New 
England.  In  the  exaggerated  expectations  which  he  had  formed 
of  them,  he  had  been  misled  by  the  English  poets,  who  had 
judged  them  by  the  quiet  colours  of  cloudy  England.  It  was 
with  no  Italian  sky,  but  with  cold  and  heavy  rain  that  Class  Day 
set  in.  The  break  in  the  weather  that  we  anxiously  looked  for 
never  came,  and  I  was  kept  a  prisoner  to  the  house  the  whole 
day.  The  following  description  of  all  that  went  on  I  quote 
from  a  letter  written  by  my  wife  :  — 

"Class  Day  this  year  broke  wet  and  stormy,  much  to  our 
disappointment.  Great  trouble  had  been  taken  to  secure  for 
us  tickets  for  everything  worth  seeing.  Without  these  tickets 
no  one  can  gain  admission.  The  Graduating  Students  are  the 
hosts,  and  issue  them  to  all  as  their  guests.  At  ten  we  had 
to  be  in  our  places  in  Sanders  Theatre.  The  whole  place 
looked  very  much  like  the  Sheldonian  at  Commemoration, 
crowded  with  mothers  and  sisters  and  cousins  in  gay  sum- 
mer dresses,  a  good  many  of  the  Professors  and  a  fair 


vii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  129 

sprinkling  of  young  men.  We  missed,  however,  the  gowns, 
Professors  looking  only  like  ordinary  mortals;  and  there  was 
no  Undergraduates'  Gallery  and  no  noise  such  as  we  are  used 
to  at  home.  Imagine,  if  you  can,  a  Commemoration  at  which 
all  was  done  'decently  and  in  order,'  no  uproar,  no  foolish 
jokes ;  but  that  is  a  flight  beyond  the  imagination  of  any  one 
who  has  seen  and  heard  Oxford  men  on  such  an  occasion. 

"  The  body  of  the  Hall  was  reserved  for  those  students  who 
were  to  receive  their  degree,  and  at  eleven  they  marched  in, 
two  and  two,  in  cap  and  gown.  The  Bishop-elect  followed 
with  the  students  who  are  the  office-bearers  of  the  year ;  they 
took  their  seats  on  the  dais  on  chairs  placed  in  front  of  palms 
and  flowering  shrubs,  with  a  gigantic  '93  in  flowers  fastened 
to  the  gallery  over  their  heads.  In  this  gallery  was  an  excel- 
lent string  band  which  played  between  the  various  exercises. 
The  meeting  began  with  prayer,  the  Bishop  praying  in  the 
name  of  the  Class  of  1893;  and  then  the  Senior  Marshal 
called  upon  the  Orator  to  begin  his  Oration.  The  Orator, 
who  was  a  member  of  the  graduating  Class  chosen  for  the 
office  by  his  classmates,  stepped  to  the  front  of  the  dais  and 
began.  He  had  learned  his  oration  carefully  by  heart,  and 
had  been  trained  in  the  method  of  delivery;  he  spoke  it 
well;  matter  and  style  were  good,  but  they  lacked  fire  and 
spontaneity.  He  was  followed  in  turn  by  the  Poet,  the  Ivy 
Orator  (whose  business  it  is  to  make  a  comic  speech  full  of 
allusions  to  what  has  lately  been  happening  in  the  University) , 
and  the  Odist,  who  repeated  a  short  ode  of  his  own  composi- 
tion. It  was  then  sung  by  every  one  to  the  tune  of  Fair  Har- 
vard, i.e.  '  My  lodging  is  on  the  cold  ground,'  which  may  be 
called  the  national  air  of  Harvard.  After  this  we  were  dis- 
missed by  the  Bishop- elect  with  his  blessing. 


130  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

"The  one  distinguishing  feature  of  the  gathering  was  its 
completely  democratic  nature.  The  President  of  the  Uni- 
versity sat  there  with  his  wife  in  the  central  seat  of  the  Audi- 
torium ;  but  he  was  nothing  more  than  one  of  the  many 
spectators.  The  Dons,  as  Dons,  were  non-existent.  The 
men  of  '93  were  everything.  They  had  chosen  the  spokes- 
men of  the  day ;  orations,  poem,  and  ode  were  all  addressed 
to  them;  every  arrangement  had  been  made  by  them,  and 
was  carried  out  by  them  as  supreme.  Even  in  what  was  said 
and  sung  there  was  not  the  slightest  reference  to  any  other 
authority.  Harvard  took  form  in  one's  mind  as  a  large 
democracy,  the  students  governing  themselves  in  all  things. 

"  Our  next  duty  was  to  attend  one  of  the  '  Spreads.'  Spread 
is  the  name  given  to  a  meal  provided  by  the  students,  and 
means  lunch  or  supper,  or  still  more  often  one  that  goes  on 
a  great  part  of  the  day.  It  is  of  the  nature  of  a  ball  suppejr ; 
salads,  sandwiches,  and  ice-creams,  with  many  varieties  of 
cake,  being  what  is  usually  provided.  Strawberries  and  cream 
are  usually  added  during  the  summer.  One  of  the  largest  and 
gayest  of  the  Spreads  on  Friday  was  held  in  the  great  Gym- 
nasium. Here  the  large  hall  had  been  adorned  with  a  pro- 
fusion of  flowers  and  evergreens,  and  with  garlands  hung  from 
side  to- side  of  the  high  roof.  Again  a  great  '93  in  flowers 
was  conspicuous  in  front  of  the  gallery.  When  we  arrived 
there  about  half-past  three  o'clock,  dancing  was  going  on 
vigorously.  The  Class  of  '93  looked  very  droll  dancing  in 
cap  and  gown.  Many  of  the  girls  had  pretty  dresses  and 
pretty  faces,  too,  the  exercise  giving  them  just  that  touch  of 
colour  which  American  girls  so  often  lack.  The  chaperones 
sat  round  the  room,  and  the  long  refreshment-table  was  down 
one  side ;  the  band  in  the  gallery  above.  The  expense  of  the 


Vli.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  131 

whole  was  borne  by  a  small  party  of  young  men  of  the  Gradu- 
ating Class. 

"  By  half-past  four  the  ball  was  over,  the  Gymnasium  deserted, 
and  we  were  once  more  plodding  through  the  rain  and  mire,  in 
goloshes  and  waterproofs,  to  the  quadrangle  in  which  were  to 
take  place  the  Tree  Exercises,  the  thing  I  was  especially  anxious 
to  see.  This  part  of  Harvard  Class  Day  is  always  considered 
the  most  important,  as  well  as  the  prettiest  sight  for  visitors  to 
see.  The  tree,  a  tall  and  stately  American  elm,  stands  in  the 
centre  of  a  wide  lawn  with  College  buildings  on  three  sides. 
For  Class  Day  the  lawn  is  enclosed  by  tiers  of  wooden  raised 
seats,  and  the  tree  is  garlanded  by  a  long  wreath  of  flowers 
wound  many  times  closely  round  the  trunk  about  ten  or  twelve 
feet  above  the  ground ;  while  the  date  of  the  year  in  crimson 
and  white  flowers  is  placed  some  eight  feet  higher  still.  Above 
this  again  the  branches  spring,  the  bark  below  being  quite  un- 
broken and  offering  a  difficult  task  enough  to  climbers.  The 
rain  continued  as  pitilessly  as  ever.  The  seats  had  been 
covered  with  awnings,  but  not  to  much  effect.  When  we 
arrived  they  were  all  shining  with  water,  and  every  here  and 
there  a  small  stream  descended  from  some  hole,  or  drop  by 
drop  fell  upon  some  devoted  bonnet  from  a  thinner  spot  in  the 
canvas.  At  five  o'clock  the  Class  of  '94  marched  in  under 
umbrellas ;  followed  by  those  of  '95  and  '96  ;  then  all  in  turn 
seated  themselves  on  carpets  which  had  been  hurriedly  spread 
upon  the  grass.  A  large  group  of  Graduates  took  up  their 
position  near  them ;  when  all  were  settled,  to  the  sound  of  a 
band  in  marched  the  men  of  '93.  First  came  the  three  marshals, 
then  the  band,  and  then  some  seventy  or  eighty  young  fellows 
in  football  dress,  stout  jerseys,  buff  knickerbockers,  long  stock- 
ings and  buff  shoes,  and  all  bareheaded.  They  came  in  two  by 


132  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

two  ;  the  men  behind  with  their  hands  on  the  shoulders  of  those 
in  front,  making  a  long,  continuous  winding  chain,  which  wound 
round  and  round  the  tree,  and  finally  formed  a  compact  mass 
encircling  it  and  the  Senior  Marshal,  who  stood  at  its  foot  in 
cap  and  gown.  Those  of  the  Class  who  were  not  to  take  part 
in  the  struggle,  also  in  cap  and  gown,  took  up  their  position 
near. 

"  And  now  began  the  cheering.  Led  by  the  Marshal  they  gave 
the  Harvard  yell  —  Rah-rah-rah  ;  Rah-rah-rah ;  Rah-rah-rah  ; 
Har  —  vard  !  rising  in  a  sort  of  yell  and  repeated  over  and  over 
again  in  perfect  time.  It  was  begun  first  by  '93,  and  then  taken 
up  by  '94,  '95,  '96,  and  the  Graduates  in  regular  succession.  They 
cheered  the  Classes;  they  cheered  the  Halls ;  they  cheered  the 
President  and  a  few  favourite  Professors,  and  then  they  cheered 
the  Ladies ;  each  body  cheering  alone  and  in  regular  order. 
Finally  all  joined  in  cheering  Harvard,  and  then  the  whole  mass 
standing,  visitors  and  students  together,  sang  Fair  Harvard* 
As  we  came  to  the  last  line  of  the  song  the  first  marshal  gave  a 
signal  to  the  athletes,  and  at  once  a  tussling  began ;  each  one 
of  them  trying  to  get  at  the  trunk  of  the  tree  and  to  mount 
high  enough  on  the  shoulders  of  the  man  in  front  to  be  within 
reach  of  the  garland.  The  struggle  was  tremendous,  like  a 
gigantic  scrimmage  at  football ;  the  mass  seemed  at  one  time 
all  legs  and  arms,  at  another  a  furious  combat  in  which  some 
one  must  lose  life  or  limb.  First  one  and  then  another  rose 
high  on  the  backs  or  shoulders  of  those  below,  only  to  fall  back 
and  be  lost  in  the  crowd.  The  spectators  cheered  and  shouted 
and  screamed  with  laughter.  When  at  last  the  first  bunch  of 
flowers  was  successfully  torn  away,  we  all  cheered  as  if  some 
great  and  glorious  victory  had  been  gained.  It  took  about  ten 
minutes  to  gain  possession  of  the  long  wreath ;  bit  by  bit  it  was 


vii.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  133 

clutched  away,  and  flung  among  the  men  below.  But  there 
still  remained  the  crimson  '93  high  above,  and  I  dare  say 
another  ten  minutes  were  spent  before  the  frantic  efforts  to 
reach  it  were  crowned  with  success.  Only  two  or  three  men  were 
brave  enough  to  attempt  the  feat ;  the  famous  gymnast  of  the 
year  was  the  one  finally  to  achieve  it.  Again  and  again  he  was 
dragged  down  ;  again  and  again  we  saw  him  engaged  in  a  free 
fight  with  obstinate  opponents  from  the  vantage  ground  of  the 
shoulders  of  his  supporters ;  his  jersey  was  torn,  his  body  must 
have  been  covered  with  bruises  and  his  nails  all  in  pieces ;  but 
in  the  end  the  rosy  '93  fell  amid  the  shouts  of  everybody,  and 
the  fun  was  over. 

"  But  only  for  a  time.  The  crowd  dispersed  to  rest  and  eat, 
and  dress  for  the  various  balls  and  receptions  which  closed  this 
busy  day.  Those  students  who  were  lucky  enough  to  have 
rooms  looking  on  the  College  Yard  had  them  thronged  with 
guests  by  eight  in  the  evening.  From  wide-open  windows  every 
one  was  looking  down  on  the  coloured  lamps  hung  from  the 
fine  trees  and  listening  to  the  Harvard  Glee  Club,  who,  in  spite 
of  the  heavy  rain,  sang  manfully  under  their  umbrellas  the  songs 
that  have  been  sung  for  so  many  years.  But  we  were  too  wet 
and  too  tired  to  go  out  again,  and  we  feel  that  we  shall  have  to 
come  back  some  day  to  Cambridge  to  see  Class  Day  under  a 
blue  sky  and  learn  what  it  really  is." 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

The  Undergraduates.  —  Harvardians  and  Oxonians  contrasted.  —  The  Ath- 
letic Craze.  —  A  Baseball  Match.  —  Games  regulated  by  the  Governing 
Body  of  the  University.  —  President  Eliot's  Report. 

OF  my  first  impressions  of  the  undergraduates,  I  made  the 
following  record  in  my  journal :  "They  are  shorter  and 
slighter  than  our  Oxford  men,  with  much  less  colour;  a  year  or 
two  older,  I  think,  unless  the  hot  climate  makes  them  look 
older.  I  do  not  see  so  many  gross,  stupid  faces,  but,  on  the 
other  hand,  I  have  not  as  yet  noticed  any  of  those  fresh-col- 
oured, pleasant,  innocent  faces  which  are  so  attractive  at  Ox- 
ford." On  seeing  more  of  the  men,  I  came  to  doubt  whether  in' 
appearance  they  were  older  than  our  undergraduates.  Near  the 
end  of  my  residence  in  Cambridge,  I  thus  sum  up  my  obser- 
vations: "How  few  are  the  signs  here  of  university  life  com- 
pared with  those  seen  in  Oxford!  In  Oxford,  a  real  town 
though  it  is,  and  not  a  suburban  village  like  Cambridge,  the 
presence  of  the  students,  nevertheless,  is  much  more  conspi- 
cuous. No  one  can  walk  about  its  streets  and  roads  without 
noticing  the  large  number  of  young  men  —  often  moving  in  a 
long  stream  —  young  men,  moreover,  who,  as  their  very  ap- 
pearance, their  dress,  their  manner  of  walking,  their  features 
show,  are  not  in  business.  In  the  afternoon  their  suit  of 
flannel  makes  it  clear  that  they  are  bent  on  pleasure,  or,  at 
all  events,  on  exercise;  in  the  morning  and  evening  the  cap 
and  gown  indicate  the  student.  The  style,  the  very  make  of 


CHAP.  viii.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  135 

their  clothes,  are  not  those  of  the  young  business  man.  Their 
easy,  confident  step  distinguishes  them  from  the  ordinary  youth 
of  a  town.  The  separation  of  the  Colleges  distributes  this  life 
over  the  city,  so  that  undergraduates  and  graduates  are  con- 
stantly passing  along  the  streets  from  College  to  College,  or 
from  College  to  the  University  buildings.  The  Parks,  the 
upper  river,  the  lower  river,  and  the  Cherwell  increase  this 
diffusion.  It  is  increased,  moreover,  by  the  Englishman's 
love  of  walking  and  riding." 

In  the  American  Cambridge  there  is  very  little  of  this  open 
and  palpable  university  life.  The  College  buildings,  which 
are  numerous,  are  mostly  in  one  enclosure,  the  Yard.  Those 
which  are  not  there  —  the  more  modern  additions  —  are  sepa- 
rated from  them  only  by  a  road.  The  students,  therefore,  in 
going  to  and  from  lectures,  do  not  cross  the  town.  Outside 
the  Yard  I  have  never  seen  them  moving  in  a  stream,  except 
on  the  days  of  some  great  baseball  or  football  match,  and 
then  they  have  but  a  few  yards  to  traverse.  Beyond  the  im- 
mediate surroundings  of  the  College  they  are  scarcely  noticea- 
ble. A  stranger,  whose  walks  did  not  lead  him  past  the  Yard, 
might  for  some  time  live  within  a  quarter  of  a  mile  of  the 
College,  without  discovering  that  he  was  in  a  University 
town.  Boston  attracts  the  students  in  large  numbers,  and  to 
Boston  they  go,  not  on  foot  but  on  the  tram-cars.  In  their 
dress,  their  general  appearance,  their  gait,  I  discover  little 
of  the  undergraduate.  In  England  and  Germany  this  clan 
does  not  hide  itself.  An  Oxford  man  lets  the  world  know 
that  he  is  an  Oxford  man.  His  self-satisfaction  gives  an 
assurance,  sometimes  even  a  kind  of  swagger,  to  his  whole 
behaviour.  He  walks  along  the  High  Street  as  if  it  belonged, 
not  to  the  Corporation,  but  to  himself.  His  apparel  too  oft 


136  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

proclaims  the  man.  There  is  nothing  of  this  here.  The 
Harvard  undergraduate  talks  of  himself  and  his  comrades  as 
boys.  He  has  not  learnt  to  swagger.  Probably  it  takes  many 
years  at  a  great  English  public  school  to  acquire  the  true 
manner.  Like  the  art  of  beating  the  French  at  Waterloo,  it 
is  best  learnt  on  the  Playing  Fields  of  Eton.  His  dress,  too, 
is  much  less  costly  and  showy;  for  the  most  part  it  is  of  a 
dark  cloth.  I  notice  none  of  those  waistcoats  with  which  an 
Oxford  man  dazzles  the  poorer  scholars  of  his  college  and 
startles  his  friends  at  home.  The  ordinary  Harvard  man 
might  have  stepped  out  of  a  city  office  or  a  Normal  School  for 
Teachers.  He  belongs  to  a  poorer  class.  Clothing,  more- 
over, is  so  expensive  that  many  have  to  be  content  with  one 
suit  a  year.  An  undergraduate  who  had  visited  Europe  in  the 
previous  Long  Vacation,  told  me  that  the  clothes  he  was  wear- 
ing, for  which  he  had  paid  three  pounds  in  England,  in  Cam- 
bridge would  have  cost  him  six.  Every  afternoon  there  are 
no  doubt  men  to  be  seen  in  the  dress  of  young  athletes;  but 
though  there  is  the  greatest  possible  interest  taken  in  the 
yearly  boat-race  with  Yale,  and  in  the  baseball  and  football 
matches,  nevertheless,  those  who  share  in  these  sports  are 
far  fewer  than  we  should  find  in  an  English  university.  It 
is,  I  am  sure,  a  picked  few  rather  than  the  mass  of  men  who 
play.  Nowhere  is  there  such  a  sight  as  is  to  be  seen  any 
afternoon  at  Oxford  on  the  river  and  in  the  Parks  on  the  days 
when  there  is  no  great  race  or  match.  The  build  of  the  men 
proves,  moreover,  that  they  have  not  gone  through  that  long 
course  of  rough  games  which  has  formed  the  active  and 
powerful  frames  of  the  young  English  undergraduates.  I  am 
told,  however,  that  during  the  winter  half  of  the  year,  North 
Avenue  is  a  training-ground  for  runners,  who  in  the  afternoon 


VIIL  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  137 

and  evening  sweep  along  the  "sidewalks,"  as  if  the  smooth 
pavement  had  been  laid  down  for  them,  and  not  for  quiet, 
decent  Christians.  A  noble  gymnasium,  moreover,  has  been 
lately  built,  which  is  much  frequented.  "The  fever  of  re- 
nown," gained  not  by  the  brain,  but  by  the  body,  is  spreading 
rapidly  through  the  veins  of  young  America.  By  its  "strong 
contagion "  Harvard  has  been  badly  caught.  One  of  my 
friends,  whose  three  sons  have  recently  graduated,  lamented 
to  me  the  excessive  interest  they  all  took  in  the  contests  of 
athletes.  How  different  it  was  when  he  was  young !  In  those 
happy  days  his  brother,  when  home  from  College,  used  to  talk 
of  books.  His  sons'  talk  was  of  running  and  jumping,  of 
rowing,  baseball,  and  football.  The  change  is  great,  indeed, 
since  the  time  when  Dr.  Wendell  Holmes  lamented  the  gen- 
eral indifference  of  the  youth  of  New  England  to  bodily 
exercise.  In  the  seventh  chapter  of  The  Autocrat  of  the 
Breakfast  Table,  he  wrote  in  the  year  1858:  "I  am  satisfied 
that  such  a  set  of  black-coated,  stiff-jointed,  soft-muscled, 
paste-complexioned  youth  as  we  can  boast  in  our  Atlantic 
cities  never  before  sprang  from  loins  of  Anglo-Saxon  lineage. 
.  .  .  We  have  a  few  good  boatmen,  —  no  good  horsemen  that 
I  hear  of,  —  I  cannot  speak  for  cricketing, —  but  as  for  any 
great  athletic  feat  performed  by  a  gentleman  in  these  lati- 
tudes, society  would  drop  a  man  who  should  run  round  the 
Common  in  five  minutes." 

Emerson,  nearly  thirty  years  ago,  speaking  of  Harvard, 
"compared  later  times  unfavourably  with  his  own.  'The 
Class, '  he  said,  '  thought  nothing  of  a  man  who  did  not  have 
an  enthusiasm  for  something. '  "  x  There  is  enthusiasm  enough 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  by  Professor  W.  W. 
Goodwin,  1891,  p.  n. 


138  HARVARD     COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

at  the  present  day,  but  far  too  much  of  it  is  enthusiasm  of  a 
baser  sort.  The  hero  of  to-day  is  the  captain  of  a  "team." 
If  a  man  should  now  be  dropped  because  he  ran  round  the 
Common  in  five  minutes,  he  would  be  dropped  because  a 
lighter-footed  rival  had  run  round  it  in  four  minutes,  fifty-nine 
seconds  and  four-fifths.  On  the  last  Saturday  in  June  I  wit- 
nessed the  fag-end  of  the  baseball  match  between  Harvard 
and  Yale.  The  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table,  kindliest  and, 
I  trust,  happiest  of  old  men,  in  his  long  life  has  seen  many 
revolutions,  political,  social,  literary,  and  scientific.  Has  he 
ever  sat  upon  the  benches  of  the  lofty  stands  on  this  great  day 
of  the  Harvard  year?  If  he  has,  he  would  have  had  to  own 
that  few  revolutions  had  been  more  rapid,  and  none  more 
thorough,  than  that  whose  effects  he  was  witnessing.  Society 
drop  a  man  who  should  run  round  the  Common  in  five  min- 
utes !  Why,  here  was  society,  unprotected  by  its  parasols,  for 
three  hours  enduring  the  blaze  of  a  New  England  midsummer 
sun,  now  carried  high  upon  the  wave  of  triumph,  now  sunk 
low  down  in  the  trough  of  despair,  as  victory  or  defeat  alter- 
nately hovered  over  the  nine  chosen  heroes  of  Harvard.  The 
Autocrat  has  known  and  has  outlived  many  famous  men.  He 
himself  was  not  the  least  of  that  group  of  men  —  that  Satur- 
day Club  —  which  gave  Boston  a  fresh  renown.  His  friends 
were  Prescott,  Emerson,  Motley,  Hawthorne,  Agassiz,  Dana, 
Lowell.  What  triumph  of  the  most  triumphant  of  these  men 
could  compare  with  that  in  which,  on  this  June  afternoon,  in 
the  year  of  grace  one  thousand  eight  hundred  and  ninety-three, 

the  immortal  Jack  H was  borne  along  and  aloft  by  those 

few,  those  happy  few,  who  had  got  hold  of  one  of  his  glorious 
limbs,  amid  the  shouts  and  the  replication  of  the  shouts  of 
surrounding  thousands?  It  was  indeed  a  great  day.  Yale 


viii.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  139 

had  been  at  last  overcome  —  Yale,  whose  long  line  of  victo- 
ries, not  only  at  baseball,  but  at  football  and  on  the  river, 
inflicts  on  Harvard  its  solitary  shame.  It  had  been  overcome, 
too,  by  the  mighty  strength  and  the  "sage  command"  of  the 

glorious  Jack  H ,  of  Jack  H ,  who  for  many  a  day, 

like  Achilles,  had  not  mingled  in  the  fray.  It  was  no  fit  of 
the  sulks  which  had  restrained  his  ponderous  arm  and  fettered, 
as  it  were,  his  huge  leg.  It  was  to  fate,  not  to  caprice,  that 
he  had  yielded.  For  five  long  weeks  he  had  been  "  on  pro- 
bation." A  man  gets  "on  probation  "  by  his  devotion  to  the 
nobler  side  of  university  life,  and  by  his  spirited  neglect  of 
his  lectures  and  his  lecturers.  While  he  is  on  it,  he  is  de- 
barred from  taking  part  in  all  matches  with  outsiders.  A 
blow,  it  was  felt,  was  impending  over  the  whole  Common- 
wealth of  Massachusetts,  with  which  the  glory  of  Harvard  is 
inseparably  bound  up ;  but  the  stern  President  did  not  yield 
to  the  indignant  outcry.  There  was  to  be  no  Rex  Supra- 
grammaticus  in  the  College,  and  the  hero,  if  he  had  not  to 
swallow  the  leek,  at  all  events  had  to  swallow  the  needful 
amount  of  knowledge.  He  did  it,  and  he  did  it  in  time. 
His  brain,  happily,  was  unaffected  by  the  unwonted  strain;  all 
that  weight  of  learning  he  bore  lightly  as  a  flower,  and  his 
unrivalled  skill  as  a  pitcher  he  displayed  in  its  fullest  extent. 
The  honour  of  Harvard,  of  Cambridge,  of  Boston,  and  of 
Massachusetts  was  saved,  and  the  pride  of  Yale,  of  New 
Haven,  and  of  Connecticut  was  laid  low. 

The  last  act  in  this  "swelling  pageant"  I  had,  as  I  have 
said,  myself  witnessed.  "Fag-end,"  I  called  it;  but  when  I 
used  that  word,  I  but  imperfectly  recalled  to  my  mind  the 
hero  and  the  triumph.  My  journal  has  refreshed  my  memory. 
The  following  is  my  record :  "  On  the  way  to  lunch  with  Pro- 


140  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

fessor ,  as  I  passed  the  entrance  to  the  baseball  ground,  I 

saw  a  body  of  police,  twenty-eight  in  number,  marching  in  to 
keep  order.  The  American  policemen  are  much  less  stolid- 
looking  than  our  men;  they  do  not  seem  part  of  a  machine. 
They  have  been  but  little  drilled.  No  mischievous  under- 
graduate, by  thrusting  his  walking-stick  between  the  feet  of 
the  front  man,  could  lay  low  a  whole  file  of  them,  as  a  whole 
file  was  once  laid  low  in  the  High  Street  of  Oxford.  They 
have  not  the  air  of  men  who  are  ever  looking  over  somebody's 
head.  Their  appearance  is  that  of  "good  householders." 
Falstaff  would  have  pressed  them  without  a  moment's  hesita- 
tion. Bardolph  would  speedily  have  had  "four  Harry  ten 
shillings  in  French  crowns  "  to  set  them  free.  Their  work 
must  be  light,  to  judge  by  a  certain  comfortable  rotundity  of 
that  part  of  the  body  which  the  English  policeman  confines 
with  a  belt.  Their  tunic  hangs  loosely.  "  Unbuttoning  thee 
after  supper "  could  never  be  uttered  by  way  of  reproach 
against  one  of  them.  I  had  scarcely  seen  the  last  of  these 
easy-going  constables,  when  there  drove  up  in  procession  four 
two-horse  flies,  containing  the  Yale  team,  and  some  of  their 
chief  supporters.  On  this  fine  summer  day  they  came  in 
closed  carriages,  as  if  they  were  too  delicate  to  stand  the  air. 
Such  "  drags  "  as  I  have  seen  in  Oxford  I  never  see  here.  I 
was  late  in  getting  back  to  the  ground,  so  hard  had  I  found  it 
to  tear  myself  away  from  the  good  talk  of  my  friend,  the  most 
cheery  of  learned  Professors.  A  vast  gathering  had  been  fol- 
lowing the  changing  fortunes  of  the  game  for  full  two  hours. 
Round  half  the  field  stands  had  been  raised  for  the  reserved 
seats,  sloping  upwards  to  the  height  of  nearly  twenty  feet. 
They  all  seemed  full.  The  very  roofs  of  the  neighbouring 
buildings  were  crowded,  while  on  the  level  ground,  and  up  the 


viii.  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  141 

sloping  bank  at  one  end  many  thousands  were  massed  to- 
gether. A  dollar  (four  shillings  and  a  penny)  was  more  than 
I  cared  to  pay  for  a  seat;  for  half  a  dollar  I  got  standing- 
room.  The  people  were  orderly  and  good-humoured,  though 
very  many,  like  myself,  got  but  glimpses  of  the  game  over  the 
heads  of  those  who  stood  in  front.  There  were  not  a  few 
negroes  in  the  crowd,  who  elbowed  their  way  like  the  rest. 
It  was  surprising  to  see  how  many  of  the  working  class  could 
afford  so  large  a  sum  as  half  a  dollar  for  admittance.  A  com- 
mon labour  ing- man,  however,  could  earn  it  by  two  and  a  half 
hours'  work. 

The  game,  so  far  as  I  could  see  it,  is  but  a  poor  one  com- 
pared with  cricket.  It  is  the  old  baseball  of  my  boyhood 
expanded  and  refined.  It  is  almost  as  much  below  cricket 
as  skittles  is  below  billiards.  It  is,  however,  far  more  easily 
understood  and  followed  by  the  ordinary  spectator.  Its  alter- 
nations of  triumph  are  sudden.  It  is  not  an  affair  of  days, 
but  of  hours.  A  match  can  be  played  between  lunch  and 
afternoon  tea;  but  what  do  these  benighted  heathen  cousins 
of  ours  know  of  afternoon  tea?  As  fortune  began  to  incline 
towards  Harvard,  the  din  of  applause  became  oppressive. 
The  cheering  —  the  "Harvard  Yell,"  as  it  is  called  — being 
mechanical,  led  by  conductors,  and  kept  up  for  many  minutes 
together,  is  tiresome.  The  undergraduates  sat  all  together, 
massed  in  rows,  one  above  the  other.  At  the  foot  of  each 
block  of  seats  stood  the  leader  of  the  cheering,  facing  the 
spectators,  and  giving  the  time  by  waving  both  his  hands,  the 
men  responding,  not  only  with  their  voices  but  with  the  move- 
ment of  the  upper  part  of  the  body.  The  Harvard  "yell" 
I  have  already  described.  Yale  responds  with  rah  nine 
times  repeated,  but  without  any  pause  at  the  third  and  sixth 


142  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

repetitions,  followed  by  Yale,  also  drawn  out  and  in  an  as- 
cending scale.  Even  Wellesley,  the  Ladies'  College,  has 
its  gentle  "yell"  — W-e-1;  1-e-s;  1-e-y;  Wellesley.  This 
cheering,  it  seemed  to  me,  went  on  all  the  time  some  great 
player  was  in,  or  else  when  the  fortune  was  so  evenly  balanced 
that  friends  needed  encouragement  and  foes  depression. 
It  was  just  as  if  at  a  cricket-match  the  clapping  was  kept 
up  through  many  "overs"  together.  Being  so  mechanical, 
it  had  none  of  that  exhilarating  effect  of  the  loud  but  brief 
applause  at  one  of  our  matches  after  a  great  hit,  which  at 
once  subsides  into  a  dead  silence  as  the  bowler  takes  the  ball 
and  prepares  to  deliver  it.  It  must  surely  mar  the  pleasure 
of  the  lookers-on,  and,  moreover,  unfairly  depress  the  oppo- 
sing nine,  who  have  to  play  in  the  continuous  din  that  is  raised 
against  them.  In  the  slang  of  the  field  this  is  known  as  "  rat- 
tling the  team."  It  is  foes,  not  friends,  who  are  rattled.  In 
this  match  it  was,  I  am  told,  carried  to  a  height  never  before 
known,  to  the  great  indignation  of  many  of  the  older  men. 
Earlier  in  the  season  the  Crimson  had  mourned  over  the  decay 
of  "the  old  Harvard  spirit,"  due,  they  maintained,  to  the 
rapid  increase  in  the  number  of  undergraduates.  This  spirit 
was  one  of  "gentlemanliness."  A  Harvard  man,  it  used  to  be 
said,  could  never  understand  "the  Yale  fondness  for  pure 
noise."  Their  understandings  must  have  been  a  good  deal 
enlightened  by  this  match,  though  perhaps  it  might  be  ob- 
jected that  the  noise  was  anything  but  pure,  having  in  view 
victory  through  intimidation. 

At  the  end  of  the  game,  when  Harvard  was  victorious,  the 
crowd  rushed  to  the  goal.  It  was  a  strange  sight  this  throng, 
till  this  glorious  moment  so  closely  packed,  so  easily  kept  in 
by  the  barrier  of  a  single  cord,  on  a  sudden  streaming  in 


vin.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  143 

dense  masses  towards  one  point.  The  victors  were  hoisted 
on  men's  shoulders  and  carried  round  the  field  at  a  running 
pace.  The  hero  of  the  day,  borne  before  all  the  rest,  was 

Jack  H ,  a  huge  mass  of  bone,  flesh,  and  muscle,  unwieldy 

but  immortal.  When  at  length  he  and  his  eight  great  breth- 
ren reached  the  Pavilion,  they  went  up  to  the  balcony  and  dis- 
played themselves  to  the  admiring  and  shouting  host  below. 
Whether  in  England,  in  the  yearly  matches  at  cricket  and 
football  between  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  such  wild  scenes  of 
triumph  are  now  to  be  witnessed  I  do  not  know.  It  is  many 
a  year  since  I  was  a  spectator;  in  the  days  when  Plancus  was 
consul  there  was  sobriety  at  all  events  in  our  games.  If  in 
the  idolatry  of  bodily  strength  and  bodily  skill  our  American 
cousins  are  carrying  craziness  beyond  even  the  point  to  which 
we  have  advanced  it,  they  are  but  bettering  our  instructions. 
Let  them  remain  where  they  are;  in  a  year  or  two  we  shall 
catch  them  up  in  the  mad  race. 

I  could  wish  that  at  Harvard  they  had  been  content  to  fol- 
low us  in  our  athletic  frenzy,  and  had  stopped  short  of  our 
slang.  Even  the  humblest  of  "  the  ten  leading  Universities  " 
of  some  Western  State  ought  to  feel  degraded  should  it  be 
spoken  of  and  written  of  as  the  'Varsity.  Thirty- five  years 
ago  in  Oxford  this  vile  pronunciation  was  confined  to  the 
men  who  hung  about  the  cricket-grounds  and  the  College 
barges,  ready  to  pick  up  a  chance  sixpence  by  rendering 
some  trifling  service,  or  to  drink  a  gentleman's  health  without 
rendering  any  service  at  all.  Even  a  junior  scout  would  have 
disdained  to  use  it.  From  these  idlers  it  passed  to  the 
cricketers  and  boating-men,  and  so  gradually  onwards  to  the 
whole  body  of  undergraduates.  Now  it  is  familiar  as  a  house- 
hold word  in  the  mouths  of  Fellows  of  Colleges  and  Tutors. 


144  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Grave  Proctors  have  not  been  kept  by  the  velvet  sleeves  of  their 
gowns  and  their  dignity  from  employing  it,  and  from  the 
lips  of  Professors  in  their  lighter  moods  it  occasionally  drops 
when  they  wish  to  show  that  they  are  not  unacquainted  with 
the  modes  of  the  modern  world.  Major  Pendennis  caught 
from  the  young  men  the  fashion  of  speaking  of  his  card  as 
his  "pasteboard."  Degradation  has  not  as  yet  spread  so  far 
as  this  at  Harvard.  No  Professor,  no  Assistant  Professor,  I 
verily  believe,  has  as  yet  lost  so  much  of  "  the  old  Harvard 
spirit "  as  to  call  his  beloved  Alma  Mater  the  'Varsity. 

Matches  are  regulated  by  the  governing  bodies  in  Harvard 
in  a  way  which  is  altogether  unknown  in  Oxford.  There  the 
control,  such  as  it  is,  is  exercised  by  each  College.  The 
University,  beyond  giving  over  part  of  the  Parks  to  the  cricket 
and  football  clubs,  knows  nothing  of  games.  At  Harvard,  up 
to  the  year  1882,  there  had  been  but  one  restriction  imposed 
on  the  athletes.  No  match  or  race  could  take  place  till  after 
the  last  recitation1  hour  on  Saturday  (one  o'clock),  or  after 
four  o'clock  on  other  days.  This  rule  shows  how  great  is  the 
difference  in  the  daily  life  of  the  two  Universities.  At  Oxford 
the  common  hours  for  exercise  are  between  half-past  one  and 
half-past  four.  In  the  winter  half  of  the  year,  by  four  o'clock 
or  a  little  later  all  the  games  at  football  are  over,  and  men 
stream  homewards  from  the  Parks,  in  all  the  glory  of  mud 
and  sweat,  not  yielding  the  path  to  any.  About  the  same 
time  the  boating-men  are  flocking  in  from  the  river.  In 
summer,  when  there  is  no  match,  the  cricketers  return  by  half- 
past  four.  They  all  come  back  in  time  to  change  their 

1  That  which  we  call  a  college  lecture,  that  is  to  say,  a  class  taken  by  a 
college  tutor,  as  distinguished  from  a  public  lecture  delivered  by  a  uni- 
versity professor,  is  at  Harvard  known  as  a  recitation. 


vni.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  145 

clothes  and  take  a  cup  of  tea  before  the  reading-men  get  to 
work  with  their  tutors.  This  kind  of  work  goes  on  till  nearly 
seven  —  the  general  hour  for  dinner  —  and  is  often  resumed 
after  a  two  hours'  interval.  In  my  time  at  Oxford,  "the 
rather  luxurious  practice,"  with  which  President  Eliot  charges 
the  Law  School,  "  of  using  for  lectures  chiefly  the  hours  from 
nine  to  one,"1  was,  I  believe,  very  general.  With  the  stroke 
of  one  we  had  done  with  lecturing  and  the  tutors  had  done 
with  us  —  the  rest  of  the  day  was  ours,  to  dispose  of  as  we 
pleased.  I  remember  the  kind  of  shock  it  gave  me  when,  on 
a  visit  to  Oxford,  two  or  three  years  after  I  had  taken  my 
degree,  calling  in  the  evening  on  a  young  and  zealous  tutor  I 
found  him  engaged  with  a  small  class  of  reading-men.  There 
used  to  be,  and  no  doubt  there  still  is,  a  great  difference,  not 
only  among  different  Colleges,  but  among  the  tutors  of  the 
same  College,  in  the  strictness  with  which  attendance  at  lect- 
ures is  enforced.  One  of  my  tutors,  who  was  described  in 
the  Cricketers'  Guide  as  "the  remains  of  a  fine  player,"  was 
full  of  indulgence  when  a  match  was  coming  off.  As  Master 
of  the  College,  he  still  kept  up  his  interest  in  games.  The 
last  time  I  saw  him  was  one  day  in  the  late  autumn  when  he 
was  drawn  in  his  Bath  Chair  to  the  Football  Field.  A  great 
match  was  to  be  played,  and  though  he  had  nearly  reached 
the  limit  of  fourscore  years,  he  would  not  miss  it.  A  pleasant 
story  is  told  of  the  kind  old  man  which  shows  the  tact  with 
which  he  governed  the  undergraduates.  The  College  boat  was 
one  year  at  the  head  of  the  river.  The  eight,  in  their  pride 
at  seeing  one  of  the  smallest  of  the  Colleges  in  this  great  posi- 
tion, invited  the  University  crew  to  dine  with  them  in  Hall. 

1  Annual  Reports  of  the  President  and  Treasurer  of  Harvard  College, 
1891-92,  p.  25. 

L 


146  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

There  is  a  limit  in  the  cost  of  the  dinner  beyond  which  no 
one  is  allowed  to  go.  This  they  would  have  exceeded  by  the 
haunch  of  venison  which  they  ordered.  The  manciple,  not 
caring  to  face  the  wrath  of  headstrong  youth,  instead  of  refu- 
sing to  provide  it,  consulted  the  Master.  He  sent  for  the  Cap- 
tain of  the  Eight,  and  told  him  that  by  a  regulation  of  the 
College  which  was  not  to  be  set  aside,  the  venison  could  not 
be  had.  As  the  young  man,  full  of  vexation,  was  leaving  the 
room,  the  old  man  called  him  back.  "You  are  going,"  he 
said,  "to  entertain  the  University  crew.  It  is  a  great  day  for 
you  and  the  College,  and  I  am  sorry  that  any  of  our  regula- 
tions, excellent  though  they  may  be  in  themselves,  should 
stand  in  your  way.  I  think  I  see  a  way  out  of  the  difficulty. 
There  is  no  rule  of  the  College  which  forbids  the  Master  to 
ask  you  to  accept  a  haunch  of  venison,  and  I  shall  have  great 
pleasure  in  sending  one  for  you  and  your  friends." 

In  Harvard,  in  the  spring  of  1882,  one  of  the  Professors, 
who  had  none  of  the  tastes  of  my  old  Master,  drew  the  atten- 
tion of  the  Faculty  to  the  list  of  matches  of  the  Baseball  Club 
for  the  coming  season.  Out  of  twenty-eight,  nineteen  were  to 
be  played  away  from  Cambridge.  "Could  the  members  of 
the  teams,"  he  indignantly  asked,  "be  said  to  be  fulfilling 
the  purpose  for  which  they  came  to  College?"  A  Standing 
Committee  on  the  Regulation  of  Athletic  Sports  was  ap- 
pointed. It  was  composed  of  three  members,  all  of  the  Fa- 
culty. They  had  the  good  sense  to  begin  their  work  by  taking 
the  leading  athletes  into  their  counsels.  "The  attitude  of  the 
young  men  was  one  of  friendly  tolerance.  They  evidently 
feared  that  in  the  main  the  Members  of  the  Committee 
were  practically  too  inexpert  to  be  safely  intrusted  with  legis- 
lation on  such  important  matters.  .  .  .  The  Faculty  received 


VIII. 


HARVARD   COLLEGE.  147 


from  them  a  remonstrance,  in  which  it  was  skilfully  but 
clearly  intimated  that  they  should  hesitate  to  pass  laws  in 
regard  to  a  game  which  they  did  not  understand.  This  gave 
rise  to  the  celebrated  mot  of  one  of  the  older  members,  a  man 
of  gentle  spirit  but  then  thoroughly  roused,  who  said  that  he 
and  his  colleagues,  it  was  true,  might  not  know  when  the 
ball  was  kicked  properly,  but  they  certainly  did  know  when  a 
man  was  kicked  improperly.  The  game  was  at  this  time 
notoriously  rough.  During  this  discussion  a  new  definition 
of  the  Rugby  game  was  given  by  a  Cambridge  wit.  '  The 
games,  '  she  said,  '  in  which  they  carry  the  ball  and  kick  one 
another.'  ' 

After  the  first  Committee  had  sat  for  three  years,  its  place 
was  taken  by  a  second  composed  of  five  members,  two  of 
whom  were  undergraduates.  All  five  were  selected  by  the 
President  of  the  University.  Like  its  predecessor,  "  it  regu- 
lated athletic  contests  as  friends  and  not  as  enemies.  Mean- 
while trouble  was  brewing  in  a  new  and  unexpected  quarter." 
The  Board  of  Overseers  took  alarm  "  at  the  abuses,  excesses, 
and  accidents  incident  to  athletic  exercises.  In  1886-87 
there  had  been,  on  the  average,  more  than  one  intercollegiate 
contest  each  week  of  the  College  year."  The  elderly  men 
who  sat  on  the  Board  looked  back  to  those  uncontentious 
days,  when  the  annual  boat-race  with  Yale  alone  disturbed  the 
smooth  current  of  university  life.  The  race  with  Oxford, 
which  in  the  summer  of  1869  lined  the  banks  of  the  Thames 
with  a  dense  crowd,  being  rowed  in  the  Long  Vacation,  was 
not  an  exception.  "  I  did  not  expect  our  crew  to  win,"  wrote 
Lowell  to  the  author  of  Tom  Brown,  "  though  I  hoped  they 
would.  Especially  I  hoped  it  because  I  thought  it  would  do 
more  towards  bringing  about  a  more  friendly  feeling  between 


or  THE 
UNIVERSITY 

or 


148  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

the  two  countries  than  anything  else.  I  am  glad  to  think 
that  it  has  had  that  result  as  it  is."  J  I  watched  the  race  from 
a  point  about  half-way  along  the  course.  The  Harvard  boat 
was  leading  by  nearly  half  a  length.  The  result  we  did  not 
learn  till  the  umpire's  steamer  came  down  the  river  with  the 
Oxford  flag  flying  at  the  top.  Some  minutes  before  the  news 
of  victory  reached  us  the  result  was  known  in  all  the  chief 
cities  of  the  United  States. 

The  alarm  of  the  Overseers  in  1888  led  to  the  appointment 
of  a  newly  modelled  Committee.  It  consisted  of  three  mem- 
bers of  the  Faculty  and  three  graduates  of  the  College,  ap- 
pointed by  the  President  and  Fellows  with  the  consent  of  the 
Overseers,  and  of  three  undergraduates  chosen  by  indirect 
election.  It  is  subject  to  the  authority  of  the  Faculty;  but 
during  the  last  four  years  this  authority  has  not  once  been 
exercised.  Saturday,  as  far  as  possible,  has  been  made  the 
day  for  all  kinds  of  contests.  On  no  other  day  of  the  week 
can  any  take  place  outside  Cambridge,  "unless  permission  is 
first  obtained  from  the  Committee  in  writing."  Articles  of 
agreement  have  been  drawn  up  by  it  between  Harvard  and 
Yale,  by  which  a  dishonest  practice  is  stopped  which  had 
crept  into  some  of  the  contests.  In  the  eagerness  for  victory, 
"men  who  were  not  bona  fide  students  and  who  were  not 
amateurs"  had  been  taken  into  the  "teams."  Harvard  and 
Yale  agreed  that  henceforth  no  one  should  be  allowed  to  play 
who  had  ever  engaged  for  money  in  any  athletic  competition. 
By  another  rule,  intercollegiate  matches  have  almost  wholly 
been  confined  to  New  England.  As  Massachusetts,  one  only 
of  the  six  New  England  States,  is  one  hundred  and  sixty 
miles  long  and  one  hundred  broad,  the  confinement  does  not 

1  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  ed.  1893,  H.  46. 


vin.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  149 

seem  excessive.  President  Eliot,  in  his  Report  to  the  Board 
of  Overseers  for  last  year,  points  out  the  evils  which  arise 
when  the  match  takes  place  near  one  of  the  great  towns. 
"The public  interest  in  baseball  and  football  has  made  it  easy 
to  collect  large  sums  of  gate-money,  both  on  College  grounds 
and  on  public  grounds  convenient  to  New  York  and  other 
cities.  The  money  thus  easily  got  is  often  wastefully  and 
ineffectively  spent.  There  is  something  exquisitely  inappro- 
priate in  the  extravagant  expenditure  on  athletic  sports  at  such 
institutions  as  Harvard  and  Yale  —  institutions  which  have 
been  painfully  built  up  by  the  self-denial,  frugality,  and  pub- 
lic spirit  of  generations  that  certainly  did  not  lack  physical 
and  moral  courage,  endurance,  and  toughness,  yet  always  put 
the  things  of  the  spirit  above  the  things  of  sense.  At  these 
Universities  there  must  be  constant  economy  and  inadequacy 
in  expenditure  for  intellectual  and  spiritual  objects;  how  re- 
pulsive then  must  be  foolish  and  pernicious  expenditures  on 
sports." *  This  collection  of  gate-money  on  College  grounds  as 
surely  admits  of  an  easy  remedy  as  it  needs  one.  The  charge 
of  a  dollar  for  a  seat  at  the  baseball  match  seems  to  me  exces- 
sive; but  this  was  surpassed  at  the  football  match  played  last 
year  between  Harvard  and  the  University  of  Pennsylvania  on 
Thanksgiving  Day,  when  the  lowest  price  for  a  seat  was  a 
dollar  and  a  half  (six  shillings  and  two  pence),  while  so  much 
as  two  dollars  and  even  two  dollars  and  a  half  was  charged. 
In  Oxford  almost  all  the  matches,  both  of  cricket  and  foot- 
ball, are  played  in  the  University  Parks,  which  are  open  to  all, 
gown  and  town  alike.  There,  without  any  payment,  I  have 
watched  even  the  great  Grace  play  —  that  summer  hero,  per- 
haps the  most  famous  man  in  England  from  May  till  August. 

1  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  14. 


150  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

In  the  remaining  eight  months  he  and  his  fame  hibernate. 
New  playing-fields  are  shortly  to  be  opened  at  Harvard.  They 
should  be  kept  pure  from  this  contamination  of  gate-money. 
"It  is  not,"  to  quote  the  President's  words,  "an  appropriate 
function  for  a  College  or  University  to  provide  periodical 
entertainments  during  term-time  for  multitudes  of  people 
who  are  not  students."1  These  multitudes  would  not  attend 
if,  as  in  the  Parks  at  Oxford,  the  spectators  had  nothing  but 
standing-room  provided,  and  that  free  of  charge.  It  is  the 
high  prices  which  make  the  spectacle  fashionable. 

In  the  last  ten  years  the  four  great  sports,  baseball,  boating, 
football,  and  athletics,  have  grown  so  fast  "  that  undergradu- 
ates are  now  unable  single-handed  to  manage  them  success- 
fully." To  "assume  the  office  of  intimate  advisers  to  the 
officers  of  each  of  the  athletic  organizations  "  was  more  than 
the  Committee  chose  to  do.  They  proposed  that  a  permanent 
Graduate  Advisory  Committee  should  be  appointed  by  each 
association,  composed  of  three  graduates  "who  in  their  own 
College  days  had  been  leaders  in  athletics."  The  plan  was 
approved  of  by  the  undergraduates,  and  the  Committees  have 
been  established. 

The  training  of  the  athletes  has  not  been  neglected  by  the 
President  and  the  Fellows.  So  early  as  1883  the  Committee 
on  Athletics  "  recommended  that  there  should  be  attached  to 
the  staff  of  the  Gymnasium  a  person  of  good  education  and 
breeding,  with  the  qualifications  requisite  to  enable  him  to 
advise  students  as  to  the  best  modes  of  training  and  practice 
in  Track  Athletics  and  Field  Sports."2  The  following  year 

1  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  12. 

2  The  word  Field  Sports  at  Harvard  does  not  mean  "  the  diversions  of  the 
field,  as  of  fowling,  hunting,  fishing"  (to  use  Johnson's  definition).      It 
means,  I  think,  such  exercises  as  jumping,  leaping,  etc. 


viii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  151 

an  Assistant  in  the  Department  of  Physical  Training  was 
accordingly  appointed.  "  He  is  an  officer  of  the  College  and 
is  paid  from  its  funds.  Under  his  skilful  training  Harvard 
has  had  teams  which  have  met  with  only  two  defeats  in  the 
intercollegiate  contests  with  Yale  in  Track  Athletics  and  Field 
Sports."  Nothing  better  shows  the  strong  hold  that  races 
and  matches  have  taken  of  Young  America  than  an  offer  made 
three  years  ago  by  some  graduates  of  Harvard  of  "  ten  thou- 
sand dollars  to  be  paid  to  Mr.  Bancroft,  who  was  then  engaged 
in  the  practice  of  his  profession  in  Boston,  for  three  years' 
service  as  coach  simply  of  the  University  and  Freshman  crews." 
The  offer  was  declined  by  the  officers  of  the  Boat  Club  —  why, 
we  are  not  told.1 

I  have  often  thought,  in  walking  by  the  river  at  Oxford  and 
watching  the  training  of  the  crews,  that  the  labour  they  under- 
went, the  strictness  of  the  discipline  to  which  they  were  ex- 
posed, and  the  abuse  which  they  had  to  suffer  in  silence, 
made  the  life  of  a  boating-man  harder  than  that  of  a  young 
soldier,  and  almost  as  hard  as  the  criminal's  on  the  treadmill. 
But  their  lot  is  freedom  itself  when  measured  by  the  standard 
of  Harvard  and  Yale.  They  breathe,  at  all  events,  the  air  of 
heaven,  and  are  not  made,  during  the  winter  months,  to  tug  at 
the  labouring  oar  in  a  dismal  vault.  In  the  long  frosts  of 
New  England  the  rivers  are  frozen  hard  and  boating  becomes 
impossible.  At  such  times  the  crews  are  exercised  in  a  great 
tank,  covered  in  and  kept  unfrozen  by  the  heat  of  a  furnace. 
There,  under  the  eye  of  their  trainer,  they  pull  their  oars 

1  These  facts  I  have  extracted  from  an  article  entitled  The  Committee  on 
Athletics,  published  in  the  Harvard  Graduates'  Magazine  for  January,  1 893. 
In  the  number  for  March,  1894,  it  is  stated  thus:  "Thousands  of  dollars 
are  now  paid  for  the  services  and  expenses  of  graduate  '  coaches.'  " 


152  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

through  the  water  without  moving  the  boat,  for  it  is  fastened 
to  the  side.  Had  Dante  seen  them  at  work,  he  would  have 
added  one  more  torment  to  his  Hell. 

President  Eliot  in  his  Report 1  deals  at  some  length  with 
the  great  and  rapidly  growing  evil  of  this  excessive  devotion 
to  athletic  sports.  He  is  fully  aware  of  the  good  that  has 
been  done  by  the  growth  of  manly  exercises  in  American 
Colleges.  "There  has  been,"  he  says,  "a  decided  improve- 
ment in  the  average  health  and  strength  of  Harvard  students 
during  the  last  twenty-five  years."  "Athletic  sports,"  he  adds, 
"have  supplied  a  new  and  effective  motive  for  resisting  all 
sins  which  weaken  or  corrupt  the  body;  they  have  quickened 
admiration  for  such  manly  qualities  as  courage,  fortitude,  and 
presence  of  mind  in  emergencies  and  under  difficulties;  they 
have  cultivated  in  a  few  the  habit  of  command,  and  in  many^ 
the  habit  of  quick  obedience  and  intelligent  subordination; 
and  finally,  they  have  set  before  young  men  prizes  and  dis- 
tinctions which  are  uncontaminated  by  any  commercial  value, 
and  which  no  one  can  win  who  does  not  possess  much  pa- 
tience, perseverance,  and  self-control,  in  addition  to  rare 
bodily  endowments."  But,  on  the  other  hand,  carried  as  they 
so  often  are  to  excess,  they  do  not  "  permit  the  main  end  of 
College  life  —  hard  study.  No  student  can  keep  up  his 
studies,  and  also  play  his  full  part  in  any  one  of  these  sports 
as  at  present  conducted.  The  faithful  member  of  a  crew  or 
team  may,  perhaps,  manage  to  attend  most  of  his  lectures 
or  other  College  exercises;  but  he  rarely  has  any  mind  to 
give  to  his  studies."  As  I  read  this  passage  I  called  to  mind 
how  nearly  forty  years  ago  one  of  my  tutors  at  Oxford  pointed 
out  to  me  —  not  that  any  pointing  out  was  needful  —  the 

1  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  pp.  12-22. 


viii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  153 

drowsy  state  in  which  a  great  oarsman  —  the  chief  glory  of 
our  College  —  always  came  to  lectures.  Over  his  Greek  and 
Latin  he  rested  from  the  real  labours  of  the  day.  He  was  as 
sleepy  over  his  book  as  he  was  wakeful  over  his  oar.  His 
vast  muscles  seemed  to  have  invaded  his  brain.  "  Wantonly 
exaggerated  athletic  sports,"  continues  the  President,  "con- 
vert the  student  into  a  powerful  animal,  and  dull  for  the  time 
his  intellectual  parts;  they  present  the  Colleges  to  the  public, 
educated  and  uneducated,  as  places  of  mere  physical  sport, 
and  not  of  intellectual  training;  they  make  familiar  to  the 
student  a  coarse  publicity  which  destroys  his  rightful  privacy 
while  in  training  for  intellectual  service,  and  subjects  him  to 
insolent  and  vulgar  comments  on  his  personal  qualities;  they 
induce  in  masses  of  spectators  at  interesting  games  an  hysteri- 
cal excitement  which  too  many  Americans  enjoy,  but  which 
is  evidence,  not  of  physical  strength  and  depth  of  passion, 
but  of  feebleness  and  shallowness;  and  they  tend  to  dwarf 
mental  and  moral  pre-eminence  by  unduly  magnifying  physi- 
cal prowess." 

In  Harvard  Stories  there  is  set  before  us  this  scene  of 
"hysterical  excitement."  The  football  match  with  Yale  is 
described,  where  the  friends  and  supporters  of  each  Univer- 
sity muster  nearly  ten  thousand  strong,  among  them  "  Gov- 
ernors, Congressmen,  Judges,  Architects,  and  Clergymen." 
After  a  long  struggle,  the  ball  is  at  length  carried  over  the 
Yale  line.  "Then  did  all  the  Harvard  hosts  shout  with  a 
mighty  shout  that  made  the  air  tremble.  For  five  minutes 
dignified  men,  old  and  young,  cheered  and  hugged  each  other, 
and  acted  as  they  never  do  on  any  other  occasion,  except, 
perhaps,  a  College  boat-race."1 

1  Harvard  Stories,  by  W.  K.  Post,  1893,  P-  23- 


CHAPTER   IX. 

Caps  and  Gowns.  —  Harvard  College  and  University.  —  The  Dormitories. 
—  Room  Rents.  —  Students'  Life  Seventy  Years  Ago.  —  Memorial  Hall. 

THE  Harvard  men  in  their  imitation  of  the  English  uni- 
versities are  doing  better  in  their  attempt  to  introduce 
the  cap  and  gown.  In  America,  republican  simplicity  has 
gone  too  far  in  abolishing  state  and  in  discarding  robes. 
Nowhere  but  in  the  Supreme  Court  at  Washington  is  so  much 
even  as  a  gown  worn  by  the  Judges.  Barristers  everywhere  are 
robeless  and  wigless.  Yet,  if  "robes  and  furred  gowns  hide 
all,"  in  the  courts  of  more  than  one  City  and  perhaps  of  more 
than  one  State  the  temptation  to  wear  them  must  surely  some- 
times be  very  strong.  In  New  York,  in  no  remote  antiquity, 
there  have  been  Judges  known  who,  it  might  have  been  ex- 
pected, would  have  kept  them  on  term  time  and  vacation,  day 
and  night.  Among  all  the  Bishops  of  the  Episcopal  Church, 
I  am  told,  there  is  but  one  apron  and  but  one  pair  of  gaiters 
to  be  seen.  What  are  they  among  sixty  millions  of  people  ? 
In  Appleton  Chapel  at  Harvard,  where  every  Sunday  evening 
the  university  sermon  is  preached,  no  seats  are  set  apart  for  the 
Professors.  The  President  even  elbows  in  his  way  with  the 
rest,  and  takes  a  place  wherever  he  may  find  one  unoccupied. 

He  and  the  immortal  Jack  H ,  if  that  hero  ever  brings 

down  his  mighty  soul  to  the  low  level  of  a  sermon,  might  sit 
shoulder  to  shoulder.     On  the  evening  when  I  attended  the 

'54 


CHAP.  ix.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  155 

service,  I  chanced  to  sit  just  behind  a  dignitary  of  the  Univer- 
sity. When,  on  standing  up  for  the  opening  hymn,  I  discovered 
that  he  was  wearing  a  dark  grey  coat  and  a  pair  of  brown  shoes, 
and  when  I  thought  of  our  Vice- Chancellor  in  the  red  and 
black  gown  of  a  Doctor  of  Divinity,  or  in  the  crimson  gown  of 
a  Doctor  of  Civil  Law,  marshalled  to  his  chair  of  state  by  the 
Bedells  with  their  silver  maces,  and  supported  by  the  long  line 
of  Doctors,  Proctors,  and  Heads  of  Houses  in  their  gowns 
and  hoods,  the  organ  pealing  forth,  and  the  whole  congregation 
—  Masters,  Bachelors,  and  undergraduates  —  rising  to  do  them 
honour,  my  mind  was  greatly  troubled.  Lost  in  thought,  it  was 
some  time  before  I  could  give  my  attention  to  the  preacher. 

The  need  of  ceremony  is  gradually  becoming  felt.  On  Com- 
mencement Day,  when  all  the  degrees  of  the  year  are  given,  the 
gown  has  for  some  while  been  commonly  worn  by  "the  Graduat- 
ing Class."  On  this  great  day,  and  on  this  alone,  the  President 
and  the  Professors  wear  their  gowns.  The  bright  adornment 
of  the  hood  was  for  the  most  part  wanting.  Nevertheless,  on 
the  shoulders  of  a  great  classical  scholar,  over  his  Harvard 
gown,  I  saw  the  blue  hood  of  a  Doctor  of  Laws  of  Edinburgh  ; 
and  on  the  shoulders  of  one  of  the  youngest  of  the  Professors, 
the  red  and  black  hood  of  a  Master  of  Arts  of  Oxford.  Some 
fifty  or  sixty  years  ago,  Professor  Ticknor  —  so  the  story  runs  — 
brought  back  from  Oxford,  where  he  had  received  an  honorary 
degree,  a  gown  which  was,  he  said,  that  of  a  Doctor  of  Civil 
Law.  This  he  wore  at  Harvard  on  solemn  occasions.  On  re- 
signing his  professorship,  he  bequeathed  it  to  Longfellow,  who 
succeeded  him  in  his  chair,  who  in  his  turn  wore  it,  and  in  his 
turn,  on  his  resignation,  bequeathed  it  to  his  successor  Lowell. 
In  its  faded  glories  the  author  of  the  Biglow  Papers  delivered 
his  opening  address,  troubled  though  he  was  by  a  doubt  that  it 


156  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

was  not  really  the  gown  of  a  Doctor  of  Oxford.  In  the  year 
T^73,  when  Oxford  conferred  on  him  an  honorary  degree, 
he  looked  round  the  Sheldonian  Theatre  for  a  robe  of  the 
same  kind  as  his  venerable  relique.  After  a  long  search  he 
discovered  a  single  specimen.  It  was,  he  was  told,  the  gown 
of  an  Archdeacon  ! 

Prescott,  if  in  his  later  years  he  was  ever  present  on  Com- 
mencement Day,  must,  I  should  think,  have  worn  the  Doctor's 
gown  which  was  conferred  on  him  at  Oxford.  "  He  had,"  says 
his  biographer,  "  already  received  more  than  one  honorary 
degree  at  home ;  but,  with  his  accustomed  ingenuousness  and 
simplicity,  remembering  how  lavishly  and  carelessly  such  dis- 
tinctions are  conferred  by  most  of  our  American  Colleges,  he 
could  not  repress  his  satisfaction  that  he  was  "  now  a  real 
Doctor." J 

The  square  cap  has  been  but  lately  introduced  —  not,  I 
believe,  before  the  summer  of  1892.  Till  then  the  tall  silk  hat 
had  been  always  worn  with  the  gown.  Nowhere  is  this  hat 
much  seen  in  New  England.  In  the  streets  of  Boston  I  doubt 
whether  it  is  worn  by  one  man  in  a  hundred.  It  is  not  there, 
as  it  is  in  the  city  of  London  and  in  the  Temple  and  Lincoln's 
Inn,  the  very  badge  of  commercial  and  professional  respecta- 
bility. Neither  is  it  seen  on  the  broad  Avenues  to  the  west  of 
Boston,  where  are  the  houses  of  the  fashionable  world.  On 
Sunday,  however,  I  am  told,  before  and  after  church  it  is  com- 
monly worn  by  highly  respectable  people.  For  Commence- 
ment the  graduating  Bachelor  bought  one  for  the  first  and  last 
time.  A  young  man  of  a  frugal  mind  was  content  with  hiring 
one  for  the  day.  At  Oxford  the  gown  of  the  honorary  Doctor 
is,  in  like  manner,  commonly  hired,  and  perhaps  sometimes 

1  Life  of  W.  H.  Prescott,  by  George  Ticknor,  p.  293. 


IX.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  157 

the  cap.  In  the  Crimson,  a  little  while  before  the  great  day  of 
last  year,  "  a  Member  of  the  Graduating  Class  who  loves  con- 
gruities  "  complained  of  "  the  incongruity  of  the  action  when  the 
Seniors  removed  their  caps  in  entering  the  auditorium  of 
Sanders  Theatre.  It  jarred  a  little  upon  one's  sense  of  fitness. 
The  cap,  indeed,  is  not  a  hat  to  be  removed  during  exercises, 
but  on  the  contrary  to  be  worn.  In  Cambridge  and  Oxford 
its  place  is  thus  understood.  The  unique  effect  of  both  is  quite 
lost  when  one  is  taken  away  ;  especially  when  the  cap  is  of  the 
peculiar  form."  The  unique  effect  of  a  large  body  of  under- 
graduates wearing  their  caps  on  Degree  Day  in  the  presence  of 
the  President  —  the  Vice-Chancellor,  that  is  to  say,  and  more 
than  the  Vice-Chancellor  —  of  this  American  University,  was 
prevented  by  a  letter  from  a  better  informed  correspondent. 

Americans,  like  all  other  foreigners,  do  not  easily  understand 
the  mixed  government  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  each  with  its 
numerous  Colleges,  self-governing  and  independent  corpora- 
tions, and  its  one  University.  In  the  Crimson,  in  an  article 
headed  The  Oxford  Student,  I  find  it  stated  that  "  no  Oxford 
student  is  allowed  to  enter  or  leave  the  University  after  nine 
o'clock.  The  gates  are  shut  at  that  time."  An  Oxford  man,  of 
course,  enters  the  University  on  the  day  he  matriculates,  and 
leaves  it  when  he  goes  out  of  residence.  Many  never  leave 
it  till  they  leave  life.  It  is  no  more  capable  of  having  gates 
than  a  Federal  Government,  or  any  other  metaphysical  body. 
In  the  New  England  Cambridge,  College  and  University  seemed 
to  me  interchangeable  terms.  For  instance,  in  Professor  Good- 
win's Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  though  the  learned 
author  mainly  considers  the  Arts  Course,  the  Course,  that  is  to 
say,  which  has  its  seat  in  the  College,  nevertheless  he  also  deals 
with  the  whole  system  of  a  University.  No  one,  so  far  as  I 


158  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

heard,  speaks  of  Harvard  University,  but  always  of  Harvard 
College.  It  was  not  till  I  turned  over  the  pages  of  the  Cata- 
logue^- that  I  discovered  the  difference.  "  Harvard  University," 
as  there  I  read,  "  comprehends  the  following  departments  : 
Harvard  College,  the  Lawrence  Scientific  School,  the  Graduate 
School,  the  Divinity  School,  the  Law  School,  the  Medical  School, 
the  Dental  School,  the  School  of  Veterinary  Medicine,  the  Bussey 
Institute  (a  School  of  Agriculture),  the  Arnold  Arboretum,  the 
University  Library,  the  Museum  of  Comparative  Zoology,  the 
University  Museum,  the  Botanic  Garden,  the  Herbarium,  and 
the  Astronomical  Observatory."  The  President  of  the  College 
is  the  President  of  every  Faculty  and  President  of  the  whole 
University.  The  Professors  of  the  College  are  Professors  of  the 
University,  but  not  all  the  Professors  of  the  University  are  Pro- 
fessors of  the  College.  The  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table, 
for  instance,  is  Emeritus  Professor  not  of  Harvard  College,  but 
of  Harvard  University.  The  accomplished  editor  of  LowelTs 
Letters  is  a  Professor  of  Harvard  College  and  also  of  Harvard 
University.  It  was,  writes  Mr.  W.  R.  Thayer,  "the  Presidency 
of  Kirkland,"  who  held  office  from  1810  to  1829,  "  that  wit- 
nessed the  expansion  of  Harvard  from  a  College  into  a  Uni- 
versity by  the  creation  of  several  departments  or  schools,  in 
addition  to  the  Academic  department."  Mr.  Thayer  never- 
theless entitles  his  work,  An  Historical  Sketch  of  Harvard 
University  from  its  Foundation  to  May,  1890.  He  thus  seems 
to  confuse  the  University  with  the  College,  going  back  for 
its  foundation  nearly  two  centuries  before,  according  to  his 
statement,  it'  was  created.  Harvard,  however,  in  the  ordinary 
sense  of  the  word  was  a  University  from  the  beginning,  for  it 
has  always  been  a  corporate  body  giving  instruction  in  "  polite 

1  The  Calendar  of  the  University. 


ix.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  159 

learning,"  and  conferring  degrees.  So  early  as  1657,  in  An 
Appendix  to  the  College  Charter,  I  find  it  stated  that "  the  Corpo- 
ration and  the  Body  of  Overseers  remain  to  the  present  time 
the  governing  powers  of  the  University."  Up  to  the  time  then 
that  the  new  Schools  were  added,  somewhat  early  in  this  century, 
the  College  was  the  University  and  the  University  was  the 
College.  Its  founders,  who  were  mainly  graduates  of  our  Eng- 
lish Cambridge,  had  hoped,  we  may  feel  sure,  that  as  wealth 
increased,  pious  founders  would  arise,  by  whose  munificence 
new  Colleges  would  cluster  round  Harvard,  as  they  had  clus- 
tered round  the  earliest  foundations  in  the  old  country,  each 
a  corporation  in  itself,  and  all  forming  one  great  University. 
Here,  as  the  years  went  by,  should  some  wanderer  come  from 
the  banks  of  the  English  Cam,  he  would,  they  dreamt,  in  very 

truth  find 

"  Parvam  Trojam,  simulataque  magnis 
Pergama." 

If  such  were  their  hopes  and  such  their  dreams,  these  hopes 
and  these  dreams  have  this  very  year  in  part  come  true ;  but 
in  a  way  which  would  have  startled  these  old  Puritans,  if  not 
dismayed  them.  By  a  vote  of  the  Governing  Bodies  of  Har- 
vard University  and  by  an  Act  of  the  Legislature,  an  institu- 
tion in  Cambridge  in  which  women  students  have  for  some 
years  received  an  academical  education,  has  been  united  to 
the  University,  while  it  still  remains  an  independent  corpora- 
tion. Radcliffe  College,  the  college  of  the  "  sweet  girl-grad- 
uates," is  the  second  founded  in  the  American  Cambridge. 
May  it  not  be  the  last ! 

Till  this  year  the  University  had  followed  a  course  of  its 
own.  Of  the  new  "Departments"  which  had  gathered  round 
it,  the  Divinity  School  alone  bears  any  likeness  to  one  of  our 


160  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Colleges.  Like  them  it  has  its  Chapel,  Library,  and  rooms 
for  residence,  but  it  has  no  separate  Corporation,  no  common 
kitchen  and  no  common  dining-hall.  The  students,  who  are 
scarcely  forty  in  number,  board  where  they  please.  They  are 
all  Bachelors  of  Arts  of  Harvard  or  of  some  other  University, 
or  graduates  of  a  Theological  School.  The  members  of  the 
Lawrence  Scientific  School  can  have  rooms  in  College.  The 
students  in  the  Law  School  have  only  the  privilege,  shared  in 
by  all  the  Departments,  of  having  their  meals  in  Memorial 
Hall.  For  their  instruction  they  have  indeed  a  stately  Hall 
and  a  noble  Library.  The  Graduate  School,  as  its  name  im- 
plies, is  composed  of  men  who  have  already  taken  their  degree. 
They  have  no  local  habitation.  The  three  Medical  Schools  are 
situated  in  Boston,  three  miles  or  so  from  Cambridge.  These 
students  live  in  lodgings.  The  School  of  Agriculture  is  on  a 
farm.  There  is,  therefore,  excluding  Divinity  Hall,  but  one 
College  in  Harvard  in  the  Oxford  and  Cambridge  sense  of 
the  word. 

To  the  Americans,  our  peculiar  Academic  system  can  be 
made  clearer  than  to  the  French  or  Germans  by  Professor 
Freeman's  ingenious  comparison  of  their  forty-two  States,  each 
self-governed,  but  held  together  by  a  Federal  Government.1 
They  are  familiar,  moreover,  with  the  notion  of  students  re- 
siding in  collegiate  buildings,  under  a  discipline  more  or  less 
strict.  "Harvard,"  writes  Professor  Goodwin,  "began  as  an 

1  Milman,  in  his  History  of  Latin  Christianity,  ed.  1858,  Vol.  VI., 
p.  102,  writing  of  the  time  of  Wycliffe,  says :  "  The  English  Universities 
had  already  begun  to  take  their  peculiar  character,  a  league,  as  it  were,  of 
separate,  independent  Colleges,  each  a  distinct  republic,  with  its  endow- 
ments, statutes,  internal  government;  though  the  University  was  still  para- 
mount, and  the  Chancellor,  with  his  inferior  officers,  held  the  supreme, 
all-embracing  authority." 


IX.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  161 

English  college  of  the  Cambridge  type,  and  it  remained  essen- 
tially an  English  college  down  to  the  early  years  of  this  cen- 
tury. ...  It  has  always  had  the  traditional  freedom  of  an 
English  college,  and  none  of  the  smaller  discipline  of  a  Ger- 
man gymnasium ;  but  it  has  never  had  any  of  the  very  different 
freedom  of  a  German  university." l  More  than  half  of  the 
students  of  the  College  live  in  great  blocks  of  buildings  known 
as  Dormitories,  mostly  standing  in  the  Yard.  These  Dormi- 
tories may  be  likened  to  the  different  quadrangles  of  a  large 
Oxford  College,  such  as  Christ  Church,  or,  better  still,  to  the 
New  Buildings  of  Magdalen  —  still  known  as  New,  though  it 
was  in  that  "  stately  pile  "  that  Gibbon  had  his  rooms.  Each 
Dormitory  stands  apart.  Round  the  Yard  there  is  no  lofty 
enclosure  with  its  single  gateway,  its  great  doors  thrown  open 
in  the  daytime  and  closed  after  dark,  its  little  wicket,  and 
its  porter's  lodge.  There  is,  to  be  sure,  at  the  main  entrance 
a  gateway  of  fine  proportions,  built  a  few  years  ago  by  a  former 
student,  but  it  stands  there  for  state,  not  for  use.  The  Yard  is 
almost  everywhere  enclosed  by  nothing  more  than  a  low  rail- 
ing, with  numerous  openings.  Undergraduates  can  leave  their 
rooms  and  return  to  them  at  all  hours.  Noctes  atque  dies 
patet  janua.  There  is  no  "gateing"  here.2 

The  twelve  Dormitories  of  the  College  "  have  accommoda- 
tions for  973  students,  provided  all  double  rooms  are  occupied 
by  two  persons."  In  the  oldest  buildings  the  occupant  has  but 
a  single  room,  in  which  he  lives  by  day  and  sleeps  by  night. 
Many  of  the  apartments  consist  of  one  sitting-room  and  two 
bed-rooms.  Two  students  often  join  together  in  taking  one  of 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  21. 

2  At  Oxford  an  undergraduate  is  said  to  be  gated  when  he  is  forbidden 
to  leave  the  College  after  the  dinner  hour. 

M 


162  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

these,  for  the  expense  of  the  sitting-room  is  shared.  "  I  shall 
chum  next  year  with  Dorr,"  wrote  Emerson,  "  and  he  appears 
to  be  perfectly  disposed  to  study  hard." l  Chumming  was  of 
old  common  enough  in  Oxford ;  the  evidences  of  it  were  left 
less  than  forty  years  ago.  When  I  entered  Pembroke  Col- 
lege in  1855,  there  did  not  happen  to  be  a  set  of  rooms  vacant. 
By  a  University  statute  an  undergraduate  was  at  that  time  re- 
quired to  sleep  within  his  College  during  his  first  three  years  of 
residence.  Another  Freshman  and  I  had  each  to  find  a  sitting- 
room  in  a  neighbouring  street.  For  a  bedroom  I  had  to 
choose  between  "  a  double  room,"  or  a  hole  under  a  staircase 
which  was  commonly  used  as  a  "  scout's "  pantry.  With  an 
Englishman's  love  of  independence,  I  chose  the  pantry.  In 
Harvard  it  often  happens  that  a  double  room  has  but  a  single 
tenant,  when  it  is  occupied  by  a  student  who  is  rich  enough  to 
pay  the  full  rent.  The  rents  range  from  $25  (,£5.2.0)  to  $350 
(^71.10)  a  year.  There  are,  however,  only  eighteen  rooms  for 
which  the  charge  is  so  low  as  $56  (^n.p.o).2  In  the  Oxford 
Colleges  the  lowest  rent  is  ^4  ($19.56).  At  Oriel  the  average 
is  £11  ($53.80)  ;  at  New  College,  ^14  ($68.46)  ;  at  Balliol, 
^£15  ($73.35).  In  Christ  Church  the  lowest  rent  is  £8 
($39.12),  and  the  highest  £28  ($137).  In  Magdalen,  even 
in  Gibbon's  "stately  pile,"  not  more  than  ^20  ($98)  is 
charged ;  in  the  other  Colleges  the  rents  are  below  this  sum. 
In  Harvard  292  rooms  are  rented  more  highly  than  the  dearest 

1  Emerson  in  Concord,  ed.  1889,  p.  23. 

2  "  The  occupants  of  the  only  low-priced   rooms  in  the  College  Yard 
dormitories   received   in  March  the  following  notice:     'By  vote  of  the 
Corporation,  February  26,  1894,  the  scale  of  prices  of  rooms  in  Hollis  and 
Stoughton  is  to  be  increased  from  the  beginning  of  the  academic  year 
1894-95.'     The  new  rates  are  from  50  to  75  per  cent,  higher  than  the 
old."     Harvard  Graduates'  Magazine,  June,  1894,  p.  604. 


IX.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  163 

in  Oxford.  As  a  considerable  set-off  against  this  higher  charge, 
the  residence  is  longer  by  eleven  weeks  in  each  year. 

In  Oxford,  when  I  was  an  undergraduate,  the  furniture  was 
always  the  property  of  the  occupant,  who  took  it,  or  as  much 
of  it  as  he  pleased,  at  a  valuation  from  his  predecessor.  What- 
ever additions  he  made  were  in  like  manner  valued.  For  the 
furniture  of  my  rooms,  which  were  in  the  Attics,  I  was  charged 
on  entrance  about  ^14  ($68.50).  I  laid  out  £4  ($19.56), 
and  received  on  leaving  nearly  as  much  as  I  had  paid  at  first. 
At  the  present  time  in  many  Colleges  the  furniture  is  owned 
by  the  Corporation,  who  charge  for  it  in  a  higher  rent.  In 
Harvard  the  rooms  are  let  unfurnished.  Professor  Peabody, 
in  his  lively  Reminiscences,  thus  describes  the  furniture  as  he 
had  known  it  nearly  seventy  years  ago :  "  In  my  time  a 
student's  room  was  remarkable  chiefly  for  what  it  did  not 
have  —  for  the  absence,  I  might  almost  say,  of  all  tokens  of 
civilization.  The  feather-bed  was  regarded  as  a  valuable 
chattel;  but  ten  dollars  [^"2.1]  would  have  been  a  fair  auc- 
tion-price for  all  the  other  contents  of  an  average  room.  I 
doubt  whether  any  fellow-students  of  mine  owned  a  carpet.  A 
second-hand  dealer  had  a  few  threadbare  carpets,  which  he 
leased  at  an  extravagant  price  to  certain  Southern  members  of 
the  Senior  Class.  The  rooms  were  heated  by  open  wood-fires. 
Almost  every  room  had  among  its  transmittenda  a  cannon-ball, 
which  on  very  cold  days  was  heated  to  a  red  heat,  and  placed 
on  a  skillet ;  while  at  other  times  it  was  often  utilized  by  being 
rolled  down  stairs  at  such  times  as  might  most  nearly  bisect  a 
tutor's  night-sleep." l 

The  late  Master  of  my  College,  who  died  less  than  three 
years  ago,  told  me  that,  when  he  was  a  Junior  Fellow,  the 

1  Reminiscences  of  Harvard  College,  p.  196. 


164  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

floor  of  the  Common  Room,  which  was  carpetless,  was 
sprinkled  with  fine  sand  every  morning.  An  ancient  Fellow  of 
Exeter  College,  who  is  still  remembered  by  one  or  two  of  the 
Seniors,  angrily  resisted  the  proposal  to  introduce  a  carpet  into 
their  Common  Room.  If  one  were  laid  down,  he  said,  he 
would  never  set  foot  on  it.  It  was  laid  down,  and  he  kept  to 
his  word. 

Mr.  Frank  Bolles,  late  Secretary  of  Harvard  University, 
whose  untimely  death  is  greatly  deplored,  recently  published  a 
curious  collection  of  letters  from  forty  students  of  the  College, 
—  all  "  very  poor,  earnest,  scholarly,  eager  to  secure  remunera- 
tive work,  and  likely  to  be  methodical  and  accurate  in  money 
matters,"  in  which  "  are  described  in  detail  their  necessary  ex- 
penses."1 Some  of  these  men  lived  in  furnished  lodgings; 
others  have  not  separated  their  room-rent  from  their  outlay  for 
furniture.  In  the  sixteen  letters  where  the  charges  are  kept 
apart,  the  lowest  expenditure  in  a  year  on  furniture  was  $5 
(£I-°-5)  >  tne  highest  $48  (,£9.16.0)  ;  the  average  being 
$20  (^4.1.8).  Some  of  this  outlay  would,  no  doubt,  be  re- 
covered by  each  student  as  he  went  out  of  residence,  but  the 
sale  is  not  managed  by  the  College  as  it  is  at  Oxford.  There 
is  no  transference  from  the  out-going  to  the  in-coming  tenant. 
Every  man  before  leaving  sells  his  furniture  as  best  he  can, 
piece  by  piece.  It  sometimes  happens  that  a  rich  student, 
in  all  the  carelessness  which  comes  from  a  full  purse,  leaves  his 
furniture  behind  as  a  present  to  his  fortunate  but  unknown 
successor. 

A  Loan-Furniture  Association  has  lately  been  founded, 
"  which  lends  students  sets  of  furniture  at  a  price  just  sufficient 
to  replace  the  property  as  it  is  worn  out.  The  charge  for  a 

1  Sttidents1  Expenses,  by  Frank  Bolles,  1893,  P-  9- 


ix.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  165 

set  is  $5  (^1.0.5)  a  year."  It  is  managed  by  a  Board  of 
Directors  chosen  by  ballot  from  among  the  officers  and  stu- 
dents of  the  University.1 

The  students  who  do  not  "  room  "  in  College  —  to  use  a 
word  in  common  use  in  America  —  reside  in  "  private  Dormi- 
tories," in  boarding-houses,  in  private  families,  or  in  ordinary 
lodgings.  The  University  Committee  on  the  Reception  of 
Students,  at  the  opening  of  each  year,  publishes  a  descriptive 
list  of  rooms  to  let,  with  the  rents  asked  for  the  academic  year. 
"This  grouping  of  facts  and  figures,"  writes  the  Secretary, 
"  has  tended  to  establish  uniformity  and  stability  in  rates.  By 
covering  a  large  residence  area,  the  list  has  extended  competi- 
tion and  made  rates  more  moderate  than  they  might  otherwise 
have  been." 2  The  following  entries  which  I  have  selected  from 
this  list  show  both  the  character  of  the  lodgings  and  the  fulness 
of  the  information  :  — 

"  Rent  $50  [^"10.4.6],  one-eighth  of  a  mile  from  the  College,  one  room 
on  the  fourth  flour  [the  third  according  to  our  reckoning,  for  in  America  the 
ground  floor  is  the  first],  twelve  feet  by  eleven,  with  one  window  to  the 
south,  furnished;  stove;  light  ;  fuel  not  provided;  no  bath-room." 

"  Rent  $200  [^40.18.0],  suite  of  two  rooms  on  the  second  floor,  one  six- 
teen feet  and  a  half  square,  the  other  sixteen  by  eleven,  with  four  win- 
dows to  the  south  and  west,  unfurnished;  stove  ;  no  fuel  or  light." 

"  Rent  $500  [,£102.4.0],  half  a  mile  from  the  College;  suite  of  two  rooms 
on  the  second  floor,  one  twelve  feet  by  fourteen,  the  other  eleven  feet  by 
thirteen,  with  five  windows  to  the  north  and  west;  stove;  bath-room; 
no  fuel  or  light." 

Many  of  the  lodgings  consist  of  only  one  room.  In  Oxford, 
in  the  lodgings  licensed  by  the  University,  in  which  alone  under- 
graduates are  allowed  to  lodge,  a  separate  bedroom  must  be 

1  Students'  Expenses,  p.  5  ;  Harvard  University,  by  Frank  Bolles,  p.  5. 

2  Students'  Expenses,  p.  5. 


166  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

provided.  It  is,  however,  sometimes  little  better  than  a  closet. 
"  Good  order  is  maintained  in  College  and  private  Dormitories 
by  graduates  or  instructors  holding  appointments  as  Proctors. 
Proctors  are  under  the  direction  of  the  Regent.  At  the  dis- 
cretion of  the  Regent,  a  Proctor  may  be  placed  in  any  private 
house  where  students  lodge,  if  the  maintenance  of  good  order 
in  the  house  seems  to  require  it." l  This  is  a  heavy,  though  a 
just  tax  on  the  householder,  who  has  to  provide  a  room  for 
the  Proctor  free  of  charge.  A  studious  set  of  men  living  in 
College  have  been  known  to  ask  that  a  more  rigorous  Proctor 
might  be  sent  to  reside  on  their  staircase. 

The  students  board  where  they  please.  There  is  no  buttery- 
hatch  or  kitchen-hatch,  whence  breakfasts,  lunches,  and  suppers 
are  sent  out  to  men's  rooms.  They  had  both  existed  in  old 
days,  for  they  were  not  among  the  institutions  from  which  the 
Puritans  had  fled,  who,  with  all  their  strictness,  were  by  no 
means  careless  of  the  creature  comforts.  In  the  early  days 
each  student  "  received  his  sizing  of  food  upon  a  pewter  plate 
and  his  beer  in  a  pewter  mug.  They  were  delivered  by  the 
butler  to  the  servitors,"  who  would  carry  them  into  the  Hall.2 
The  buttery-hatch  fell  first.  In  the  first  year  of  this  century  it 
was  closed  forever.  The  kitchen-hatch  struggled  on  for  a  few 
years  longer,  but  it,  too,  was  at  length  closed.  "  Commons," 
the  meals  provided  by  the  College  and  eaten  in  the  Hall, 
continued  till  i849.3  Professor  Peabody  gives  the  following 


1  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  5.    "  The  Regent  is  a  University 
officer  who  exercises  a  general  supervision  over  the  conduct  and  welfare  of 
the  students."     Catalogue,  p.  32. 

2  The  Early  College  Buildings  at  Cambridge,  by  A.  M.  Davis,  p.  22. 

8  An  Historical  Sketch  of  Harvard  University -,  by  W.  R.  Thayer,  1890, 
p.  42. 


IX.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  167 

description  of  a  student's  fare  and  daily  life,  as  he  had  known 
it  seventy  years  ago  :  — 

"  The  student's  life  was  hard.  Morning  prayers  were  in  sum- 
mer at  six ; l  in  winter  about  half  an  hour  before  sunrise,  in  a 
bitterly  cold  chapel.  Thence  half  of  each  Class  passed  into 
the  several  recitation-rooms,  and  three-quarters  of  an  hour 
later  the  bell  rang  for  a  second  set  of  recitations,  including  the 
remaining  half  of  the  students.  Then  came  breakfast,  which, 
in  the  College  Commons,  consisted  solely  of  coffee,  hot  rolls 
and  butter,  except  when  the  members  of  a  mess  had  succeeded 
in  pinning  to  the  nether  surface  of  the  table,  by  a  two-pronged 
fork,  some  slices  of  meat  from  the  previous  day's  dinner.  Be- 
tween ten  and  twelve  every  student  attended  another  recitation 
or  a  lecture.  Dinner  was  at  half-past  twelve.  There  was  another 
recitation  in  the  afternoon,  except  on  Saturdays ;  then  evening 
prayers  at  six,  or  in  winter  at  early  twilight ;  then  the  evening 
meal,  plain  as  the  breakfast,  with  tea  instead  of  coffee,  and 
cold  bread  for  the  hot  rolls.  After  tea  the  Dormitories  rang 
with  song  and  merriment  till  the  study-bell,  at  eight  in  winter, 
at  nine  in  summer,  sounded  the  curfew  for  fun  and  frolic,  pro- 
claiming dead  silence  throughout  the  College  premises.  On 
Sunday  all  were  required  to  attend  worship  twice  each  day  in 
the  College  Chapel.  .  .  .  The  charge  for  Commons  was  a 
dollar  and  seventy-five  cents  a  week  [seven  shillings  and  two 
pence] .  The  food  had  not  been  deficient  in  quantity,  but  it 
was  so  mean  in  quality,  so  poorly  cooked  and  so  coarsely  served 
as  to  disgust  those  who  had  been  accustomed  to  the  decencies 
of  the  table,  and  to  encourage  a  mutinous  spirit,  rude  manners, 

1  Dr.  Johnson,  writing  from  University  College,  Oxford,  on  June  I,  1775, 
says:  "I  went  this  morning  to  the  chapel  at  six."  Letters  of  Samuel 
Johnson,  I.  323. 


168  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

and  ungentlemanly  habits ;  so  that  the  dining-halls  were  seats 
of  boisterous  misrule  and  nurseries  of  rebellion."  l 

It  was  in  coming  from  Hall  that  Prescott  the  historian  was 
struck  in  the  eye  by  a  piece  of  hard  crust  thrown  by  a  disor- 
derly student,  and  half-blinded  for  life.  Like  Milton,  he  was 
supported  in  his  task  —  supported  by  a  deep  love  of  learning 
and  an  unconquerable  spirit. 

In  defiance  of  rules,  the  undergraduates  began  to  take  their 
meals  outside  the  College.  It  was  in  vain  that  President 
Quincy,2  who  came  into  office  in  1829,  purchased  in  England 
for  the  use  of  the  Hall  a  handsome  service  of  plate  stamped 
with  the  College  seal.  During  the  war  between  the  North  and 
the  South  it  was  all  sold.  For  some  time,  however,  it  had  been 
lying  idle,  for  "Commons"  had  been  abolished  a  few  years 
earlier.  When  the  kitchen  was  closed,  "  the  half-score  or  more^ 
of  swine,"  no  doubt,  disappeared ;  in  Professor  Peabody's  time 
they  had  been  kept  in  sties  close  to  the  back  of  the  Hall. 

For  fifteen  years  the  students  boarded  where  they  pleased  — 
singly  or  in  clubs.  According  to  the  American  custom,  even 
those  who  lived  in  lodgings  must  have  gone  out  of  the  house 
for  their  meals.  Our  lodging-house  system,  where  each  lodger 
provides  his  own  food  and  has  his  meals  in  his  own  room,  and 
where  the  landlady  supplies  the  cooking  and  the  service,  is  un- 
known in  New  England.  All  who  occupy  rooms  in  a  house 
either  take  their  meals  at  one  common  table  or  go  abroad  for 
them.  There  could  be  no  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table  with 
us.  Our  Autocrat  would  be  a  king  without  subjects.  In  1865, 

1  Reminiscences,  pp.  29,  197. 

2  The  name  of  this  distinguished  New  England  family  is  always  pro- 
nounced Quinzy.    The  English  author  De  Quincey  is  in  like  manner  by 
Americans  called  De  Quinzey. 


ix.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  169 

the  Corporation  fitted  up  an  old  railway  station  for  a  dining- 
club.  As  they  had  met  with  no  success  as  caterers,  they  put  it 
mainly  under  the  management  of  the  members.  How  far  had 
"Fair  Harvard"  sunk  beneath  its  English  model  —  "but  oh 
how  fallen  !  "  —  with  its  undergraduates  dining,  not  in  a  noble 
hall,  but  in  a  renovated  "  depot."  *  The  age  of  meanness  was 
soon  to  pass  away.  In  the  Civil  War  twelve  hundred  and  thirty- 
nine  Harvard  men  served  in  the  army  and  navy  of  the  North. 
Ninety-five  fell  fighting  on  the  side  of  liberty.  To  their  mem- 
ory a  noble  building  has  been  raised  under  the  name  of 
Memorial  Hall. 

In  it  more  than  a  thousand  students  take  their  meals.  As 
they  pass  in  through  the  spacious  transept,  they  see  inscribed 
before  them  on  the  walls  the  names  of  those  who  fell.  Few 
more  touching  records  are  anywhere  to  be  read  than  the  long 
list  of  these  men  who  died  for  their  country,  most  of  them  in 
the  very  prime  of  their  youth.  Here  in  a  few  simple  lines, 
without  one  wasted  word  of  praise,  are  given  each  man's  name, 
his  birthplace,  his  age,  his  standing  in  the  University,  and  the 
battle  in  which  he  fell.  Dull,  indeed,  must  be  the  heart  of  the 
young  American  who  does  not  here  feel  his  love  strengthened 
for  that  Union  and  that  liberty  which  these  men  died  to  save. 

"  So  nigh  is  grandeur  to  our  dust, 

So  near  is  God  to  man, 
When  Duty  whispers  low,  Thou  must, 
The  youth  replies,  I  can" 

The  dining-hall  is  hung  round  with  the  portraits  of  Harvard 
worthies,  old  Presidents,  Judges,  and  Governors  of  the  Common- 

1 A  railway  station  —  or  rather  I  should  say  a  railroad  station  —  is  com- 
monly called  a  depot.  Though  in  trait  and  restaurant  the  final  /  is 
sounded  by  Americans,  in  depot  it  is  left  silent. 


170  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  ix. 

wealth;  soldiers  and  builders-up  of  Constitutions;  Story  the 
great  jurist ;  Prescott,  Emerson,  Motley,  Longfellow,  and  Lowell. 
Here  stands  the  bust  of  Charles  Russell  Lowell ;  "  the  perfec- 
tion of  a  man  and  a  soldier,"  as  Sheridan  said  of  him.  Fifteen 
years  before  the  battle  at  Cedar  Creek,  in  which  he  fell,  his 
uncle  had  urged  the  lad  "  to  pay  his  way  honourably  in  life  by 
being  of  use."  l  He  paid  his  way  full  royally. 

1  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  I.  181. 


CHAPTER  X. 

A  Visit  to  Three  Dormitories.  —  Dining  Clubs.  —  The  Liquor  Law.  — 
Baths.  —  Signs  and  "  Shingles. "  —  Clubs.  —  Politics.  —  Christmas.  —  A 
Student's  Library. 

ON  a  pleasant  afternoon  in  June  a  friendly  undergraduate 
showed  me  three  sets  of  rooms ;  the  first  in  a  lodging- 
house,  the  second  in  Hastings,  the  most  modern  of  the  Dormi- 
tories, and  the  third  in  Matthews,  a  Dormitory  built  twenty-one 
years  ago.  In  the  lodging-house  he  himself  lived  with  three 
friends,  each  having  a  separate  bedroom,  but  all  sharing  in  a 
common  sitting-room.  I  might  almost  have  thought  myself  in 
a  comfortable  lodging  in  Oxford.  In  the  sitting-room  there 
was  a  piano  and  a  couch  or  two,  but  none  of  those  absurdly 
deep  and  low  chairs  in  which  the  English  undergraduate 
delights,  though,  if  his  room  is  small,  a  single  one  nearly  blocks 
it  up.  On  the  walls  hung  engravings  and  photographs,  mostly 
gathered  by  my  undergraduate  friend  in  a  recent  tour  in 
Europe.  There  is,  I  am  told,  a  small  knot  of  men  which 
affects  engravings  after  Burne-Jones,  Rossetti,  and  their  school 
of  painters.  On  the  shelves  there  was  a  large  and  well-chosen 
set  of  books,  most  of  them  historical,  for  he  was  studying  his- 
tory. I  asked  him  how  with  his  three  chums  —  "  room-mates," 
to  use  the  American  term  —  he  managed  to  secure  a  quiet 
time  for  study.  He  replied  that  he  mostly  read  in  the  Library 
—  in  a  room  set  apart  for  students  of  history,  and  well  stocked 
with  all  the  works  they  can  need.  Of  the  authors  most  in 

171 


172  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

request  there  are  several  copies  kept.  His  meals  he  took  in 
Memorial  Hall.  He  complained  much  of  the  quality  of  the 
food  and  the  cookery.  Though  in  his  own  home  a  plain  table 
was  kept,  nevertheless  the  fare  always  seemed  to  him  luxurious 
after  Harvard.  Some  allowance  must  probably  be  made  for 
the  ordinary  discontent  of  an  undergraduate.  I  remember 
how  in  my  college  days  some  of  my  fellow-students  grumbled 
over  their  dinner  —  "it  was  not  fit,"  they  said,  "  for  a  gentle- 
man to  eat "  ;  though  it  was  quite  as  good  as  any  young  fellow 
with  a  healthy  appetite  could  require,  and  much  better  than 
many  got  at  home.  From  a  late  number  of  the  Crimson  I 
have  extracted  the  following  information  about  the  meals  in 
Memorial  Hall :  "  There  have  been  on  the  average  one  thou- 
sand and  eighty-five  students  per  meal,  half  at  the  club  tables 
and  half  at  the  general  tables.  The  price  of  board  has  aver- 
aged for  the  past  year  three  dollars  ninety- two  cents  [i6s.] 
a  week.  The  bread  is  baked  in  the  kitchens.  The  food  left 
over  is  never  served  again  in  any  form,  but  is  sold  daily  to 
the  poor  people  of  Cambridge.  Among  the  items  of  expendi- 
ture are  756  boxes  of  oranges,  13,680  pounds  of  grapes, 
590  pounds  of  honey,  306  tons  of  ice,  and  534  tons  of 
coal."  The  consumption  of  ice  seems  enormous;  in  an 
Oxford  College  I  doubt  whether  in  my  time  a  single  pound 
was  bought  for  use  at  the  table,  and  even  now  it  is  very  rarely 
seen.  Ices,  if  we  indulged  in  any,  were  ordered  from  the 
confectioner's.  In  America  ice  is  everywhere  used  at  almost 
every  meal,  at  all  events  in  the  summer.  If  they  ever  come 
to  take  afternoon  tea  like  other  good  Christians,  they  will,  I 
verily  believe,  begin  it,  and  perhaps  end  it,  with  a  glass  of  iced 
water.  Ice-cream  —  ice-milk  would,  I  suspect,  more  accurately 
describe  the  dish  —  is  twice  a  week  served  instead  of  pudding 


X.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  173 

to  the  one  thousand  and  eighty-five  students  in  Memorial  Hall, 
and  is  served  plentifully.  Americans  who  have  travelled  com- 
plain of  the  niggardliness  of  the  helping  of  ices  in  England.  At 
my  first  evening  party  at  Cambridge  I  was  so  much  astonished 
at  the  size  of  the  piece  that  was  brought  me  that  I  asked  the 
servant  to  let  me  have  only  half  the  quantity.  Even  then  I 
had  at  least  three  times  as  much  as  I  was  used  to  at  home. 
Everything  is  on  a  great  scale  in  the  United  States  —  even 
ices.  After  this  experience  I  had  no  difficulty  in  understand- 
ing how  one  thousand  and  eighty-five  students  required  three 
hundred  and  six  tons  of  ice  for  thirty-six  weeks  of  residence. 
After  all,  it  only  gives  them  a  weekly  allowance  of  seventeen 
and  a  half  pounds  for  each  man,  and  a  great  deal  of  it  they 
take  in  icing  their  water. 

The  charges  of  Memorial  Hall  were  too  high  for  the  poorer 
students,  who,  in  1889,  founded  a  Club  of  their  own,  under  the 
name  of  the  Foxcroft.  It  opened  with  sixty  members,  but  in 
less  than  three  years  it  numbered  over  two  hundred.  It  pro- 
vides no  common  meal,  but  every  one  orders  what  he  pleases, 
as  at  a  tavern.  The  average  expenditure  is  less  than  two 
dollars  eighty  cents  a  week  (eleven  shillings  and  six  pence), 
while  some  membeia  bring  theirs  as  low  as  two  dollars  (eight 
shillings  and  two  pence).1  A  student  gives  the  following 
curious  account  of  a  club  on  a  much  smaller  scale  :  — 

"  I  have  tried  boarding  in  several  ways  and  find  the  most  pleasant  and 
economical,  as  well  as  healthful,  to  be  a  club  of  about  twenty-five  men, 
which  we  manage  ourselves.  We  have  an  organization  under  the  man- 
agement of  a  board  of  three  Directors,  who  oversee  matters,  recommend 
members,  and  decide  other  questions.  We  hire  a  lady  who  furnishes 
dining-room  and  everything,  except  dishes,  and  prepares  the  food.  A 
Steward  collects  the  board,  buys  provisions,  and  manages  the  finances  for 

1  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  5;   Students'  Expenses,  p.  4. 


174  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

his  board.  Monthly  statements  show  the  financial  standing,  and  we  live 
as  well  as  possible  upon  $2.50  [icw.  $d.~\  per  week.  We  have  good  food 
and  plenty,  as  attested  by  the  fact  that  each  of  our  men  has  gained  in 
weight  each  year.  Many  wiser  heads  have  predicted  our  failure,  but  by 
close  economy  and  a  general  feeling  of  co-operation,  we  are  this  year 
more  prosperous  than  ever."1 

It  is  in  vain  for  any  young  scapegrace  of  a  student  at  dinner 
in  an  American  University  "  to  remember  the  poor  creature, 
small  beer."  To  desire  it  would  show  as  vilely  in  him  as  in 
Prince  Hal.  My  friend,  the  undergraduate,  told  me  that  this 
prohibition  had,  he  thought,  a  bad  result.  It  was  better  for 
those  who  liked  a  glass  of  beer  to  take  it  at  their  meals,  and 
not,  as  they  now  do,  in  their  rooms.  It  cannot  be  bought  in 
Cambridge,  which,  with  its  widely-scattered  population  of 
seventy  thousand  thirsty  souls,  has  put  itself  under  the  prohi- 
bition law;  but  it  is  got  in  casks  or  in  bottles  from  Boston, 
and  is  offered  to  callers  as  wine  used  to  be  offered  at  Oxford. 
After  a  great  victory  at  baseball  or  football,  men  are  known  to 
go  all  the  way  to  Boston  to  drink,  and  often  drink  heavily. 

Under  the  guidance  of  my  friend,  I  passed  from  his  lodgings 
to  Hastings  Dormitory,  where  the  accommodation  is  excellent. 
Like  the  other  dormitories,  it  is  built  with  separate  staircases, 
on  much  the  same  plan  as  an  Oxford  College.  There  were, 
moreover,  bath-rooms  for  common  use,  and  a  water  supply  to 
each  floor.  In  all  the  other  dormitories  the  water  has  to 
be  carried  up  in  cans  from  the  ground  floor,  as  is  still  the 
case  in  most  Oxford  Colleges.  Every  staircase  has  its  por- 
ter and  "  goody."  The  "  goody  "  corresponds  to  our  bed- 
maker.  "  Tenants  who  desire  to  employ  any  one  to  make 
fires,  black  boots,  etc.,  must  arrange  with  the  porters  of  the 
buildings  in  which  they  live."  So  says  the  University  Catalogue. 

1  Students'  Expenses,  p.  35. 


X.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  175 

The  porter  is  not  required  to  carry  up  fuel  or  water,  to  light 
the  fire,  to  carry  down  the  ashes,  or  to  take  care  of  the  lamps* 
For  each  of  these  services  there  is  a  separate  charge.  The 
poorer  students  save  their  money  by  doing  some  or  all  of  these 
duties  themselves.  My  guide  hoped  that  a  wealthy  benefactor 
would,  before  long,  be  found,  who  would  lay  a  supply  of  water 
on  every  floor  of  every  dormitory.  The  use  of  the  bath  in  the 
bedchamber  is,  I  was  informed,  not  common.  Less  than  sixty 
years  ago  it  was  scarcely  known  at  Oxford.  The  Head  of  one 
of  our  Colleges,  who,  on  Sunday  evenings  when  he  is  in  the 
vein,  charms  the  Common  Room  with  his  stories  of  past  days, 
told  me  that  soon  after  he  entered,  an  aggrieved  "  scout "  com- 
plained to  one  of  the  tutors  of  an  undergraduate  on  his  staircase, 
who  required  him  every  day  to  carry  all  the  way  up  to  his  room 
a  can  of  cold  water  for  his  morning  bath.  The  tutor  replied 
that  he  could  not  interfere,  and  that  his  master's  orders  must 
be  obeyed.  At  the  same  time  he  sent  for  the  youth,  who,  like 
Swift,  "  washed  himself  with  oriental  scrupulosity,"  and  remon- 
strated with  him  on  the  needless  trouble  he  was  giving.  "  I 
myself,"  he  added,  "take  a  hot  bath  once  a  week,  and  no 
gentleman  need  take  more."  When  I  entered  Oxford  in  the 
year  1855,  the  morning  bath  had  become  somewhat  general. 
At  Harvard,  the  River  Charles  which  flows  hard  by,  into  which 
Longfellow,  Lowell,  and  the  Autocrat  of  the  Breakfast  Table 
used  to  plunge,  is  now  too  foul  for  bathing.  There  are  no 
public  baths  in  the  town.  The  Gymnasium  has  a  few,  but  a 
very  few.  In  the  Crimson  I  have  seen  more  than  one  com- 
plaint of  their  deficiency.  In  this  respect  Harvard  is  far 
behind  Yale,  whose  noble  gymnasium  is  amply  supplied.  It 
has  been  said,  and  with  some  reason  too,  that  Harvard  has 
only  to  make  its  wants  known,  when  a  benefactor  speedily 


176  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

arises.  I  trust  that  the  voice  of  a  stranger  may  reach  a  rich 
man's  ears,  and  remove  this  reproach  from  a  great  University. 
The  rooms  we  visited  in  Hastings  were  on  the  top  floor. 
They  were  pleasant  and  comfortable  —  very  like  the  rooms  in 
one  of  our  Colleges,  only  the  bedchamber  was  far  better. 
There  was  the  wide  window-seat  with  its  red  cushions  and  out- 
look over  the  tops  of  the  graceful  American  elms.  Above  the 
two  doors  of  the  sitting-room  were  hanging  one  or  two  printed 
notices,  which  had  been  appropriated  or  misappropriated  by 
some  means  or  other.  It  is  the  pride  of  a  Freshman  to  have 
his  walls  adorned  with  signs  and  "  shingles "  which  he  has 
"  ragged." 1  An  oblong  piece  of  wood  called  a  shingle  takes 
the  place  in  America  of  the  brass  plate  on  the  outside  door. 
It  is  not  fastened  to  the  door,  but  is  hung  near  it  on  the  wall. 
These  shingles,  and  in  fact  all  kinds  of  announcements  and 
notices,  the  adventurous  Freshman  delights  to  carry  off,  sur- 
veying his  room  with  just  pride,  when  he  sees  on  the  walls 
such  inscriptions  as  :  "  Jones  &  Co.,  Civil,  Sanitary,  and  Land- 
scape Engineers";  "Thomas  Smith,  M.D.,  Office  Hours  2-4; 
7-9  "  ;  "  Hair-dressing  and  Complexion  Parlors  "  ;  "  Under- 
takers. Locker's  Casket  Warehouse  "  ;  "  The  College  Dining 
Rooms  and  Ice  Cream  Parlors."  These  trophies  correspond 
to  the  door-knockers  which  have  been  known  to  adorn  the 
rooms  of  a  Christ  Church  undergraduate.  One  kind  of  shin- 
gles is  won  by  easier,  but,  perhaps,  no  less  glorious  means. 

"  Peace  hath  her  victories  no  less  renowned 
Than  war." 

Harvard  abounds  in  clubs,  and  each  club  has  its  own  shingle. 

1  "Ragging simply  means  stealing"  —  Harvard  Stories,  by  \V.  K.  Post, 
p.  66. 


X.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  177 

These  are  not  looked  upon  as  lawful  trophies  of  war.  There 
is  honour  among  thieves.  Shame  and  not  glory  would  be  the 
lot  of  him  who  should  hang  on  his  walls  the  shingle  of  a  club 
to  which  he  did  not  belong.  So  nice  is  the  point  of  honour 
that,  much  as  admission  into  some  of  these  clubs  is  coveted, 
when  the  period  of  election  is  drawing  near,  a  youth  of  a  deli- 
cate mind,  if  he  has  a  friend  among  the  members,  shuns  his 
rooms  for  fear  he  should  be  suspected  of  improperly  canvassing 
him  for  his  vote.  With  the  cavalier  poet  he  would  say,  — 

"  I  could  not  love  thee,  dear,  so  much, 
Loved  I  not  honour  more." 

Some  clubs,  it  should  seem,  are  started  only  to  increase  the 
display  of  shingles.  A  student  told  me  that  he  belonged  to 
more  than  one  which,  to  the  best  of  his  knowledge,  had  never 
met  since  the  day  of  their  creation.  Undergraduate-nature 
seems  to  be  the  same  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  however 
much  it  may  vary  in  its  manifestations.  In  America  it  is  per- 
haps a  little  more  transparently  boyish.  Some  of  these  clubs 
imitate  the  follies  of  Freemasonry  in  their  secret  rites  of  initia- 
tion. Their  very  names  they  try  to  conceal,  letting  themselves 
be  known  to  outsiders  only  by  one  or  two  letters  of  the  Greek 
alphabet.  The  most  famous  of  all  the  clubs,  the  Phi  Beta 
Kappa,  —  "our  beloved  Phi  Beta  Kappa,"  as  Professor  Good- 
win justly  calls  it,  —  which  was  founded  in  1779,  remained  a 
mystery  for  more  than  fifty  years.  It  was  not  till  1831  that 
"the  veil  of  secrecy  was  withdrawn,  and  the  mystic  letters 
<I>.  B.  K.  were  found  to  stand  for  <$>iAoo-o<£io,  Bww  Kv/SepvrJr^s  — 
Philosophy  the  guide  of  life.  The  A.  K.  E.  is  now  the  most 
harmful  society  in  the  College ;  its  regular  meetings  resemble 
the  Kneipe  of  German  students ;  its  neophytes  are  subjected  to 


178  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

silly  and  injurious  hazing,  under  the  guise  of  initiation."  These 
three  letters  stand  for  the  Dickey  Club,  a  society  conspicuous 
for  its  brutality  and  its  folly.1  A  few  years  ago  it  carried 
matters  to  such  a  pitch  that  its  barbarous  rites  of  initiation 
were  made  known  by  the  father  of  a  student  whose  health  had 
suffered  under  them.  A  strong  and  general  feeling  of  indigna- 
tion was  roused.  Fortunately  the  members  are  often  satisfied 
with  merely  bringing  down  the  neophyte  to  their  own  level,  by 
compelling  him  publicly  to  make  a  fool  of  himself.  He  is 
forced  to  dress  himself  in  a  ridiculous  costume,  and  either  in 
the  streets  or  at  some  great  baseball  or  football  match  to  strut 
about.  So  much  is  this  the  practice,  that  if  any  young  man  is 
seen  in  the  neighbourhood  conspicuously  making  a  fool  of  him- 
self, without  the  justification  of  being  drunk,  he  is  at  once  set 
down  as  a  candidate  for  the  Dickey  Club.  The  members 
would  do  well  to  change  their  name  to  the  Dogberry  Club,  and 
to  take  as  their  motto,  —  "  But,  masters,  remember  that  I  am 
an  ass."  Nevertheless,  so  strange  is  the  timidity  of  youth  in 
the  presence  of  their  own  set  of  companions,  that  not  many 
men,  as  I  am  informed,  when  elected  to  these  clubs  dare  to 
decline  the  dishonour.  Timid  though  some  of  these  youths 
may  be,  nevertheless,  if  the  need  arose,  they  would  show,  I 
have  little  doubt,  that  though  they  dared  not  face  the  scoffs 
of  the  Dickey  Club,  they  were  not  unworthy  sons  of  the  men 
who  faced  death  on  the  bloody  battle-fields  of  Virginia. 

In  our  universities  such  follies  are  unknown ;  they  have  even 
well-nigh  died  out  in  our  public  schools.  We  are  not  indeed 

1  "The  A.  K.  E.  (I  am  informed),  like  $.  B.  K.,  is  a  fraternity  having 
branches  in  many  colleges;  the  Harvard  society  started  as  a  branch  of  this, 
but  has  long  since  ceased  to  recognize  any  connection  with  the  general 
society." 


X.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  179 

free  from  a  certain  kind  of  tyranny  even  in  Oxford.  The 
undergraduate,  poor  though  he  may  be,  who  does  not  pinch 
himself  to  subscribe  to  the  boat-club  is  too  often  looked  upon 
askance.  I  remember  hearing  one  of  my  companions  spoken 
ill  of  on  this  account.  He  was  very  poor,  but  when  the  Flor- 
ence Nightingale  Fund  was  raised  his  subscription  was  the 
largest  in  the  College. 

Not  a  few  of  the  Harvard  Clubs  have  shaken  themselves  free 
from  these  follies  of  initiation  and  secrecy.  It  is  not  easy  to 
believe  that  in  some  of  them  they  had  ever  existed.  Emerson 
was  elected  to  a  club,  and  became  thereby,  as  he  wrote  to  his 
brother,  "  one  of  the  fifteen  smartest  fellows."  It  is  incredible 
that  the  New  England  philosopher,  even  when  in  a  short 
jacket,  ever  consciously  made  a  fool  of  himself.  "  There  are," 
said  Burlingame,  the  first  American  Minister  to  the  Court  of 
Pekin,  "  there  are  twenty  thousand  Ralph  Waldo  Emersons  in 
China."  We  could  as  easily  picture  to  ourselves  Confucius 
submitting  to  being  "  hazed  "  as  the  sage  of  Concord. 

The  Medical  Faculty  Club  deserves  immortality  for  one  of 
its  pranks.  "  It  conferred  its  honorary  degrees  liberally  upon 
conspicuous  persons  at  home  and  abroad.  Not  only  did  it 
raise  Chang  and  Heng,  the  Siamese  twins,  and  Day  and  Martin, 
the  proprietors  of  the  celebrated  blacking,  to  the  rank  of 
Doctors  of  Medicine,  but  it  had  the  audacity  to  send  a  di- 
ploma to  Alexander,  Czar  of  all  the  Russias.  The  Emperor, 
not  to  be  left  behind  in  the  race  of  honour,  sent  to  the  Medical 
Faculty  Club  a  valuable  case  of  surgical  instruments,  which  by 
a  fortunate  mistake  was  delivered  to  the  Medical  School  of  the 
University." l  It  is  perhaps  by  no  means  wonderful  that  the  his- 
torian Motley,  himself  a  Harvard  man,  many  years  later  writing 

1  An  Historical  Sketch  of  Harvard  University ',  by  W.  R.  Thayer,  p.  61. 


180  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

of  "  the  affection  which  is  supposed  to  exist  between  Russia 
and  America,"  said  :  "  At  any  rate  it  is  a  very  platonic  affec- 
tion ;  being  founded,  however,  on  entire  incompatibility  of  char- 
acter, absence  of  sympathy,  and  a  plentiful  lack  of  any  common 
interest,  it  may  prove  a  very  enduring  passion." l  The  wit  of 
the  Medical  Faculty  Club  has  long  been  a  matter  of  the  past. 
"  Its  proceedings  have  been  kept  so  secret  for  so  many  years 
that  only  on  Class  Day  are  even  the  Seniors  who  belong  to  it 
known,  from  their  wearing  a  black  rosette  with  a  skull  and 
bones  in  silver  upon  it."  When  these  clubs  first  took  their  rise 
Harvard  was  little  more  than  a  great  school.  The  students 
were  mostly  mere  lads,  and  the  discipline  was  strict,  as  it  had 
been  of  old  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  It  is  no  longer  a 
school.  It  is  a  university  and  a  great  university.  It  is  time 
for  it  to  put  away  childish  things. 

The  strife  of  the  last  Presidential  election  led  to  the  forma- 
tion of  two  political  clubs  —  The  Harvard  Republican  Club 
and  The  Democratic  Campaign  Club.  Under  their  manage- 
ment a  vote  was  taken  of  the  whole  body  of  undergraduates. 
It  showed  that  if  the  choice  of  President  had  been  in  their 
hands,  General  Harrison  would  have  carried  the  day  over 
Mr.  Cleveland  by  1114  votes  to  851.  The  learning  of  the 
University  went  the  other  way.  Of  the  Professors  whose 
views  could  be  ascertained,  a  very  large  majority  indeed  were 
for  Mr.  Cleveland.  The  Democratic  Club  came  to  an  end 
with  the  election,  but  not  before,  to  quote  the  Harvard  Grad- 
uates' Magazine,  "it  had  strengthened  the  feeling  that  there 
is  no  incompatibility  between  one's  membership  in  a  univer- 
sity like  Harvard  and  a  dignified  participation  in  political 
affairs,  even  in  a  strictly  partisan  way."  What  a  curious  in- 
1  Correspondence  of  J.  L.  Motley,  New  York,  1889,  II.  336. 


X.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  181 

sight  is  given  by  such  a  passage  as  this  into  the  vast  difference 
between  England  and  America  in  the  great  field  of  politics  ! 
In  England,  at  all  events  outside  London,  a  man  who  should 
altogether  refuse  to  play  his  part  in  political  life,  would  be 
much  less  respected.  However  dignified  he  might  be,  if  he 
stood  quite  aloof  from  public  affairs,  he  would  be  looked  upon 
as  a  bad  citizen.  Day  has  dawned  in  the  United  States,  and 
good  men  are  seeing  that  the  more  corrupt  party-life  may 
be,  the  more  it  is  each  man's  duty  to  do  his  best  to  work  its 
purification. 

The  Harvard  Republican  Club,  numbering  about  six  hundred 
active  members,  still  carries  on  its  operations.  During  the 
Presidential  election  it  far  outdid  any  Society  that  ever  existed 
for  the  Diffusion  of  Knowledge  —  or  Ignorance.  More  than 
thirty  thousand  speeches,  documents,  and  circulars  were  sent  to 
the  students  in  Cambridge.  In  the  great  Republican  torch-light 
procession  in  Boston  "  over  six  hundred  Harvard  Republicans 
marched,  wearing  crimson  gowns  and  white  caps,  the  Law 
School  being  distinguished  by  the  barrister's  wig."  The  wig, 
a  compliment,  we  may  take  it,  to  the  English  Bar,  is  some  slight 
compensation  for  the  general  aim  of  the  Republican  party  to 
ruin  our  trade.  For  the  first  time,  we  are  told,  in  American 
political  history  "  College  speakers  "  (thank  heaven,  they  are 
not  called  orators  !)  were  sent  about  to  public  meetings.  At 
Oxford,  in  my  time,  the  speeches  of  undergraduates  were 
confined  to  the  narrow  limits  of  the  College  Debating  Societies 
and  of  the  Union.  They  never  overflowed  into  the  town  and 
the  neighbouring  villages.  I  remember  how  much  surprised 
I  one  day  was  on  learning  that  some  of  my  friends  —  two  of 
them  now  famous  as  writers  on  constitutional  history,  one  a 
Liberal  and  the  other  a  Liberal-Unionist  —  were  going  all  the 


182  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

way  to  Birmingham  to  hear  John  Bright  make  one  of  his  great 
speeches.  Had  we  ever  thought  of  speaking,  in  those  days 
of  a  narrow  franchise  our  eloquence  would  have  been  of  little 
avail.  It  was  not  till  working-men  got  a  vote  that  youthful 
speakers  bestirred  themselves.  In  the  old  days  in  a  corrupt 
constituency  such  as  Oxford  then  was,  and  among  the  squires 
and  farmers  in  the  surrounding  counties,  no  undergraduate 
would  have  got  a  hearing. 

Harvard  boasts  of  three  Musical  Clubs,  The  Glee  Club,  The 
Pierian  Sodality,  and  The  Banjo  and  Mandolin.  Of  their  skill 
I  know  nothing,  but  in  their  dealings  with  each  other  they 
seem  to  be  unusually  harmonious.  In  the  short  Christmas 
vacation  of  the  winter  before  last,  uniting  in  one  body,  they 
made  a  musical  tour  throughout  the  country.  The  first  per- 
formance they  gave  on  December  22,  at  New  York,  and  the  last 
at  Albany  on  January  2,  having  in  the  meantime  travelled  as  far 
west  as  Milwaukee,  a  great  city  on  the  shore  of  Lake  Michigan. 
I  doubt  whether  a  Club  of  Oxonians  would  traverse  a  longer 
distance  than  these  wandering  musicians,  were  they  in  a  like 
tour  to  begin  their  performances  in  Brussels  and  end  them  in 
Paris,  having  in  the  short  interval  of  eleven  days  given  them 
also  in  Venice,  Genoa,  and  Naples.  The  trip  was  taken  in  the 
midst  of  the  American  winter.  So  much  were  the  trains 
delayed  by  the  snow  that  once  at  least,  if  not  twice,  the  musi- 
cians were  prisoners  in  a  snow-drift  at  the  very  time  that  they 
ought  to  have  been  in  the  Music  Hall.  It  seems  strange  to 
us  that  so  large  a  party  of  young  men  should  be  willing  to  be 
away  from  their  homes  at  Christmas.  Longfellow  recorded  in 
his  Journal  on  December  25,  1856  :  "  Not  a  very  merry 
Christmas.  We  are  in  a  transition  state  about  Christmas  in 
New  England.  The  old  Puritan  feeling  prevents  it  from  being 


X.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  183 

a  cheerful,  hearty  holiday,  though  every  year  makes  it  more 
so."1  Samuel  Sewall,  one  of  the  cruel  judges  who  sent  the 
Salem  witches  to  the  gallows,  more  than  once  records  in  his 
Diary,  with  great  satisfaction,  the  utter  disregard  of  the  festival, 
in  spite  of  the  efforts  of  a  Church  of  England  governor.  Time, 
no  doubt,  has  done  much  to  loosen  the  bonds  of  Puritanism, 
and  to  give  a  cheerfulness  and  a  heartiness  to  the  holiday  in 
lands  where  once  it  was  strictly  not  kept ;  but  the  genius  of  one 
man  has  done  even  more  than  time.  Neither  New  England 
nor  Scotland  has  been  able  to  withstand  the  kindly  influence  of 
Charles  Dickens.  In  the  diffusion  of  the  Christmas  spirit  his 
Christmas  Carol  has  done  more  than  all  the  Societies  and  all 
the  preachers.  I  remember  a  story  of  a  poor  half-witted  fellow 
who  lived  in  a  village  in  Scotland.  When  the  yearly  fast  came 
round,  which  was  kept  on  different  days  in  different  parishes, 
oppressed  by  the  gloom  of  his  own  village  he  was  heard  to 
say,  "  I'll  just  go  across  the  burnie  and  hear  them  whistle." 
The  Scotch  and  the  New  Englanders,  now  that  the  general 
joy  of  Christendom  has  been  brought  home  to  their  hearts, 
have  become  in  like  manner  oppressed  by  the  gloom  in  which 
they  were  spending  the  great  yearly  festival.  They  have  done 
much  to  scatter  it;  but  "the  rear  of  darkness"  still  seems  to 
overhang  them,  or  we  should  not  have  seen  these  lads,  far 
from  their  homes,  spending  so  much  of  Christmas-tide  in  a 
Pullman  car. 

This  digression  about  Clubs  has  led  me  far  away  from  my 
friendly  undergraduate  and  from  my  visit  to  students'  rooms. 
He  next  led  me  to  Matthews  —  one  of  the  Dormitories  in  the 
Yard.  Here,  too,  I  could  almost  have  thought  that  I  was  in  an 
Oxford  College,  and  here,  too,  I  found  shelves  well  stocked 

1  Life  of  H.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  290. 


184  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

with  books.  I  was  not  to  infer,  I  was  told,  from  what  I  had 
seen  that  afternoon,  that  the  ordinary  undergraduate  owns  a 
library.  I  have  examined  the  expenses  of  the  forty  poor  stu- 
dents published  by  the  Secretary  of  the  University,  and  find 
that  their  average  yearly  expenditure  on  books  and  stationery 
—  for  these  two  items  are  not  kept  apart  —  was  about  nine- 
teen dollars  and  a  half  (^3.19.8.).  One  man  one  year 
raised  his  outlay  to  fifty  dollars  (^10.4.0.),  and  one  brought 
his  as  low  as  four  and  a  half  (i8s.  5d.).  As  I  looked  over 
my  host's  collection  I  called  him  "an  honest  man,"  think- 
ing how  Johnson,  when  he  was  shown  Dr.  Burney's  collec- 
tion, said  to  him :  "  You  are  an  honest  man  to  have  formed 
so  great  an  accumulation  of  knowledge."  He  replied  that 
from  childhood  he  had  been  brought  up  to  think  that  he 
ought  to  have  books  of  his  own.  I  wish  wealthy  Englishmen 
could  have  had  this  wholesome  belief  given  them  from  their 
cradle.  It  would  be  a  blessed  time  for  authors.  Even  re- 
spectability, the  god  at  whose  altars  we  offer  up  our  most 
costly  sacrifices,  no  longer  requires  that  the  home  of  an  English 
gentleman  should  have  a  decent  library.  So  far  as  books  go 
he  is  naked  and  not  ashamed. 

My  host  showed  me  a  copy  of  The  Pilgrim's  Progress  which 
he  had  lately  had  splendidly  bound.  It  was,  he  said,  the  first 
book  that  he  had  ever  loved  ;  most  of  it  he  knew  by  heart. 
He  quoted  Johnson's  saying  to  Percy's  little  daughter,  when 
the  great  man  found  that  she  had  not  read  it :  "  No ;  then  I 
would  not  give  one  farthing  for  you  "  ;  but  by  a  slip  of  memory 
he  confused  Bishop  Percy  with  Bishop  Butler.  I  told  him  how 
the  only  time  I  had  the  honour  of  meeting  Mr.  Gladstone,  he 
had  insisted  on  the  pre-eminent  place  Butler  held  among  the 
great  writers  of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  how  I  had  re- 


X.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  185 

marked  how  strange  it  was  that  the  author  of  the  Analogy  is 
nowhere  mentioned  either  in  Johnson's  recorded  talk  or  in  his 
writings.  Our  host  knew  enough  of  English  ways  to  give 
us  afternoon  tea.  He  flavoured  it  with  slices  of  lemon  instead 
of  cream,  after  the  Russian  fashion.  He  had  invited  one  or 
two  of  his  friends  to  meet  us,  and  the  time  slipped  pleasantly 
by  in  a  talk  about  authors  and  books. 

Had  I  visited  a  room  in  one  of  the  more  ancient  Dormi- 
tories, I  might  have  been  shown  names  and  dates  carved  in 
the  woodwork  by  earlier  occupants.  These  short  and  simple 
annals  have  not  been  written  in  the  light  of  day.  They  are 
cut  in  some  secret  place,  behind  the  wainscot  or  under  the 
floor.  The  new-comer  oft-time  has  a  long  search  before  he 
can  discover  them.  He  adds  his  name  and  preserves  the 
mystery. 


CHAPTER  XI. 

Harvard  "  Boys."  —  "  Harvard  Indifference."  —  Harvard  and  Yale.  — 
Honest  Poverty.  —  Oxford  Servitors.  —  Poor  Students.  —  "  Muney 
Aids." 

AN  anecdote  which  I  have  from  a  Senior  —  a  man,  that  is 
to  say,  in  his  fourth  year  —  seems  to  indicate  a  certain 
modest  timidity  in  the  American  undergraduate.  Nowhere  in 
the  United  States,  I  am  told,  does  a  young  man  carry  a  walking- 
stick.  It  belongs  there  to  the  evening  of  life,  as  it  belonged 
in  ancient  Greece.  That  it  was  used  half  a  century  ago  is 
shown  by  a  regulation  of  1849  forbidding  a  student  to  take 
his  cane  into  Chapel.  An  attempt  has  been  lately  made  to 
reintroduce  it  into  Harvard,  probably  by  some  undergraduate 
who  has  been  to  England,  and  noticed  how  in  our  Universi- 
ties it  has  become  as  indispensable  a  part  of  the  outfit  for 
walking  as  a  hat.  My  friend  the  Senior  says  that  hitherto  it 
has  only  been  under  the  cover  of  night  that  he  and  his  friends 
have  ventured  to  carry  a  cane.1  I  hope,  by  the  way,  that  they 
do  carry  it,  and  do  not  commit  the  vulgarity  of  letting  it 
touch  the  ground,  as  if  it  were  of  any  manner  of  use  to  them. 
I  am  not  sure,  on  second  thoughts,  that  an  English  under- 
graduate has  any  more  courage  in  doing  what  is  unusual.  In 

1  A  friend  who  has  read  my  proof-sheets  writes  to  me :  "I  am  afraid  this 
man  was  playing  on  your  credulity.  Almost  every  student  carries  a  cane, 
except  when  going  about  in  Cambridge  for  exercise,  or  to  lecture."  If  the 
story  is  not  true,  it  ought  to  be;  so  I  leave  it  in. 

186 


CHAP.  XL  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  187 

my  day  we  never,  when  in  cap  and  gown,  carried  an  umbrella, 
however  heavily  it  might  rain.  We  used  to  wrap  our  gowns 
round  our  shoulders  and  run.  This  point  of  etiquette  no 
longer  exists.  It  has  yielded,  I  conjecture,  to  the  large  in- 
crease in  the  number  of  undergraduates  not  lodging  in  Col- 
lege. Even  at  the  present  day,  a  man  carrying  a  walking- 
stick  when  he  is  in  cap  and  gown  is  a  sight  never  seen  in 
either  graduate  or  undergraduate.  A  cripple  alone  can  vent- 
ure to  use  one  without  blushing.  It  is  only  a  few  years  ago 
that  a  Master  of  Arts,  a  Fellow  and  Tutor  of  his  College, 
gravely  pointed  out  to  me  the  impropriety  of  which  I  was 
guilty  in  using  a  walking-stick  when  in  my  Academic  costume. 
I  have  never  repeated  the  offence,  except  once  when  I  was 
lame.  On  the  other  hand,  an  undergraduate,  and  perhaps 
even  a  Junior  Fellow,  would  have  a  feeling  of  uneasiness,  if 
not  of  positive  shame,  if  he  were  caught  walking  about  in  his 
ordinary  costume  without  a  cane  in  his  hand.  A  cane,  I  have 
been  told  on  very  good  authority,  is  the  distinguishing  sign 
of  the  University  man  when  not  in  cap  and  gown.  Without 
it  a  "man  "  may  be  mistaken  for  an  errand-boy.  The  use  of 
the  word  man,  not  only  in  our  universities,  but  even  in  our 
schools,  nay,  in  our  preparatory  schools,  where  boys  are  no 
more  to  be  found  than  the  pinafores  which  were  worn  in  my 
young  days,  is  a  sign,  however,  of  the  greater  confidence  of 
the  English  youth.  In  America,  boys  are  still  boys,  at  all 
events  in  name;  for  often  they  are  forward  enough  in  con- 
duct. Even  in  Harvard  there  are  no  men  among  the  under- 
graduates; they  always  speak  of  themselves  as  boys.1 

Harvard  has  not  been  quite  free  from  a  certain  kind  of 

1  The  same  friend  writes  to  me :     "  This  is  chiefly  among  the  students 
from  the  West;  not  at  all  so  in  the  case  of  the  typical  student,  least  of  all 


188  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

affectation  which  is  only  too  common  in  the  English  Universi- 
ties, but  which  is  known  in  America  as  "Harvard  indiffer- 
ence." It  was  not  from  their  forefathers  that  the  New  Eng- 
landers  got  this  poor  quality.  It  was  never  carried  across  the 
sea  in  the  ships  of  the  early  settlers.  It  is  the  very  opposite 
of  that  stubborn  strength  of  character,  and  of  that  burning 
zeal  which  sent  them  to  the  wilderness,  and  their  descend- 
ants, "the  embattled  farmers,"  to  Concord,  Lexington,  and 
Bunker  Hill.  It  is  the  contempt  for  all  that  eagerness  of 
heart  and  thought  and  life  which  inspires  "  the  young  enthu- 
siast" when  first  "he  quits  his  ease  for  fame."  "I  do  not 
love  a  man,"  said  Goldsmith,  "who  is  zealous  for  nothing." 
These  lovers  of  indifference  he  would  have  shunned.  Long 
indulged,  it  becomes  ingrained  in  the  character.  It  is  a  great 
maker  of  bad  citizens.  In  a  young  man  it  almost  always 
begins  with  affectation,  and  happily  often  dies  an  early  death. 
It  is  killed  by  his  nobler  qualities,  or  by  some  strong  influ- 
ence from  without. 

More  than  sixty  years  ago  Channing  rebuked  it.  When 
the  Revolution  of  1830  broke  out  in  France,  he  was  "asto- 
nished that  the  freemen  of  America,  especially  the  young, 
should  be  so  moderate  in  their  expressions  of  joy.  He  went 
back  in  memory  to  his  boyish  days,  when  the  Cambridge  col- 
legians had  processions,  speeches,  and  bonfires.  Now  all  was 
still.  One  evening  a  graduate  called  upon  him.  '  Well,  Mr. 

,'  said  he,  'are  you  too  so  old  and   so  wise,  like   the 

young  men  at  Harvard,  as  to  have  no  foolish  enthusiasm  to 
throw  away  upon  the  heroes  of  the  Polytechnic  School  ?  '  '  Sir, ' 
answered ,  '  you  seem  to  me  to  be  the  only  young  man  I 

one  who  has  social  training."  I  was,  however,  much  struck  with  the  use  of 
the  term  boy  ;  so  I  leave  the  text  unchanged. 


XI.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  189 

know. '  '  Always  young  for  liberty,  I  trust, '  replied  Dr.  Chan- 
ning  with  a  bright  smile  and  a  ringing  tone,  as  he  pressed 
him  warmly  by  the  hand."1  Thirty  years  had  to  pass,  and 
then  this  Harvard  indifference  was  swept  away  by  the  South- 
ern revolt.  In  the  presence  of  that  dreadful  strife,  indiffe- 
rence would  no  longer  have  been  ridiculous,  it  would  have 
become  hateful. 

Professor  Goodwin  thinks  that  it  was  by  "the  equable 
pressure"  of  a  revised  system  of  instruction  and  examina- 
tion that  "the  older  enthusiasm"  of  the  place  was  mainly 
repressed,  and  this  indifference  was  encouraged.2  Free  play 
was  no  longer  given  to  the  student's  mind.  He  was  forced 
to  attain  to  mediocrity  in  many  subjects,  and  was  not  en- 
couraged, and  was  scarcely  allowed  to  secure  excellence  in 
one  or  two.  There  had  been  students  who  had  refused  to 
cramp  themselves  in  the  narrowness  of  the  prescribed  course. 
Lowell  read  widely,  and  was  rusticated  in  consequence. 
Motley  escaped  this  disgrace,  but  not  the  reproach  of  his 
tutor,  who  one  day  "  remonstrated  with  him  upon  the  heaps  of 
novels  upon  his  table.  '  Yes, '  said  Motley,  '  I  am  reading 
historically,  and  have  come  to  the  novels  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  Taken  in  the  lump,  they  are  very  hard  reading.'  "3 
At  the  present  day  the  author  of  The  Biglow  Papers  and  the 
historian  of  the  Dutch  Republic  could  have  indulged  their 
tastes  to  the  full.  This  "Harvard  indifference  "  cannot  surely 
long  survive  the  great  reforms  in  education  which  have  already 
done  so  much  to  transform  the  University  from  a  mere  place 
of  teaching  to  a  place  of  learning. 

1  Memoir  of  W.  E.  Channing,  1848,  III.  304. 

2  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  13. 
8  Holmes's  Memoir  ofj.  L.  Motley,  ed.  1889,  p.  13. 


190  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

There  is  another  fault  for  which  Harvard  men  are  reproached 
by  their  rivals  and  enemies.  They  are  distinguished,  it  is 
said,  by  a  certain  priggishness,  a  certain  consciousness  too 
openly  shown  that  they  are  not  only  the  salt,  but  the  superfine 
salt,  of  the  earth  —  a  priggishness  and  a  self-consciousness 
which,  it  is  said,  sometimes  cling  to  them  throughout  life. 
What  Boston  is  to  Masachussetts,  what  Massachusetts  is  to 
New  England,  what  New  England  is  to  the  United  States, 
what  the  United  States  are  to  the  Universe,  that  Harvard  is  to 
Boston.  Among  "  the  five  points  of  Massachusetts  decency  " 
laid  down  by  Wendell  Phillips,  to  be  a  graduate  of  Harvard 
College  holds  the  second  place.  The  "old  Harvard  spirit" 
on  which  they  prided  themselves,  was  thought  by  some  to  be 
the  spirit  of  a  gentleman  carried  to  preciseness.  They  are 
fond  of  telling  a  story  of  a  man  who  had  twin  sons,  one  of 
whom  he  sent  to  Harvard,  and  the  other  to  Yale.  Before 
they  entered  College,  no  one,  not  even  their  father,  could  tell 
them  apart;  but  after  graduation  the  difference  was  plain. 
One  was  a  Harvard  gentleman,  the  other  a  Yale  tough.  Wealth 
and  family  are  said  to  count  for  much  at  Harvard.  The  New 
Englander  is  as  proud  of  his  pedigree,  and  often  with  as 
much  reason,  as  any  English  nobleman  or  squire.  A  Bache- 
lor of  Arts  of  Yale,  who  recently  spent  two  years  at  Harvard, 
the  first  as  a  graduate-student,  and  the  second  as  an  instruc- 
tor,—  evidently  a  fair-minded  man, —  writes:  "I  have  lived 
long  enough  at  Yale  to  know  that  Yale  students  are  not  com- 
monly ruffians;  and  I  have  seen  enough  of  Harvard  to  know 
that  Harvard  students  are  not  as  a  class  snobs.  Yet  there  is 
a  slight  element  of  truth  even  in  these  gross  caricatures;  it  is 
the  difference  between  'Fair '  Harvard  and  'Dear  Old  '  Yale. 
The  Harvard  atmosphere  occasionally  produces  '  an  affectioned 


xi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  191 

ass,'  and  the  Yale  spirit  sometimes  turns  out  an  insolent 
rowdy."1 

I  have  been  told  by  one  familiar  with  the  Continental  Uni- 
versities that,  measured  by  their  standard,  the  Harvard  stu- 
dents are  deficient  in  those  graces  which  were  so  dear  to  Lord 
Chesterfield's  heart.  In  formal  politeness,  in  the  lesser 
morals,  the  students  in  their  behaviour  towards  a  Professor 
fall  short  of  the  standard  which  is  observed  in  Germany  and 
France  in  their  behaviour  towards  each  other.  Nevertheless, 
beneath  this  somewhat  unpolished  outside  much  real  kindness 
lies  hidden.  A  young  Professor,  who  had  but  recently  joined 
the  University,  told  me  that  in  the  midst  of  the  work  of  his 
first  term  he  had  been  struck  down  by  diphtheria.  His  pupils 
not  only  every  day  sent  flowers  and  fruit,  but  begged  that  one 
of  them  in  turns  should  always  sleep  in  his  house  as  long  as 
the  illness  lasted,  so  that  in  case  of  sudden  need  there  might 
be  a  swift  messenger  close  at  hand  to  summon  the  doctor. 
He  had  won  their  hearts,  as  I  learnt  from  another  source,  by 
his  courage  and  his  devotion  to  his  work.  As  soon  as  he 
knew  the  nature  of  his  illness,  he  had  sent  them  word  that  he 
was  attacked  by  a  dangerous  malady,  which  would  very  likely 
carry  him  off;  but  that  he  hoped  that  they  would  go  on  with 
the  experiments  on  which  he  had  left  them  engaged.  To 
such  students  as  these  might  be  applied  Goldsmith's  saying 
about  Johnson :  "  He  has  nothing  of  the  bear  about  him  but 
the  skin." 

Whatever  pride  of  wealth  and  birth  may  exist  in  Harvard 
or  in  Yale,  no  student  in  either  of  these  great  Universities 
need  hang  his  head  for  honest  poverty.  Many  of  them  gain 
their  own  living  more  or  less,  and  gain  it  by  bodily  labour. 

1  The  Harvard  Crimson,  June  23,  1893. 


192  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Wages  are  so  much  higher  in  America  than  in  the  old  country 
that  it  takes  far  less  time,  and  draws  far  less  on  a  man's 
strength  for  him  to  earn  money  by  the  use  of  his  arms  and 
legs.  Bodily  work,  happily,  is  not  commonly  looked  upon 
as  anything  degrading.  To  gain  his  livelihood  by  the  sweat 
of  his  brow  is  not  disgraceful  even  in  an  undergraduate. 
Emerson,  when  a  student  in  Divinity  Hall,  after  he  had  taken 
his  degree  as  a  Bachelor  of  Arts,  falling  ill,  went  to  his  uncle's 
farm  for  a  change.  The  Emersons  were  too  poor  for  idle- 
ness, so  he  helped  to  till  the  ground.  "Working  here  in  the 
field  with  a  labourer,  they  fell  a-talking,  and  the  man,  a 
Methodist,  said  that  men  are  always  praying,  and  that  all 
prayers  are  answered.  This  statement  struck  Emerson,  and 
upon  this  theme  he  wrote  his  first  sermon,  which  he  preached 
that  summer  in  Waltham  in  the  church  of  his  uncle  Ripley. 
Next  day  in  the  stage-coach  a  farmer  said  to  him,  '  Young 
man,  you'll  never  preach  a  better  sermon  than  that.'  "l  Not 
only  will  students  work  on  a  farm,  for  which  they  might  as 
Republicans  plead,  if  they  were  weak-minded  enough  to  need 
a  plea,  the  example  of  the  ancient  Romans,  but  they  work  as 
servants.  They  have  not  that  miserable  shame  of  "  doing  any- 
thing menial "  which  so  often  besets  needy  people  in  the  old 
country,  who  would  think  it  less  dishonourable  to  live  on  alms 
than  by  honest  service.  When  I  was  at  Yale,  I  was  told  that 
the  poorer  students  of  that  University,  without  any  loss  of 
general  estimation,  help  to  gain  their  livelihood  by  bodily 
work.  Some  of  them  in  the  winter  tend  house-furnaces,  which 
only  need  looking  after  early  every  morning  and  late  every 
evening.  In  America,  the  whole  house  is  often  warmed  by  a 
single  furnace  in  the  cellar,  whence  hot-water  pipes  are  carried 

1  Emerson  in  Concord,  1889,  p.  31. 


XL  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  193 

to  the  hall  and  all  the  rooms.  The  maid-servants  never 
attend  to  it,  for  it  is  not  thought  to  be  fit  work  for  a  woman. 
Wages  are  so  high  that  it  is  only  the  wealthy  who  can  afford  to 
keep  a  man-servant,  so  that  the  furnace  must  be  tended  by 
the  master  of  the  house  and  his  sons,  or  by  an  odd- job  man. 
Such  a  man  is  said  "to  do  the  chores."1  A  student  tries  to 
get  two  or  three  houses  to  look  after  in  the  same  part  of  the 
town,  so  that  he  may  not  lose  time  in  going  from  one  to  the 
other.  Some  give  their  services  as  waiters  at  the  clubs  where 
their  comrades  take  their  meals,  receiving  in  return  their 
board  free  of  charge.  I  was  assured  by  an  undergraduate 
that  no  one  is  thought  worse  of  for  doing  such  work  as  this. 
Emerson,  in  his  first  year  at  Harvard,  had  a  room  rent-free  in 
the  President's  house,  by  holding  the  post  of  President's 
Freshman.  He  had  to  carry  official  messages  to  the  students 
and  officers  of  the  College. 

It  was  common  enough  in  Oxford  till  early  this  century 
for  undergraduates  to  wait  at  table.  Dr.  Johnson  repre- 
sented to  Lord  Macaulay's  great-uncle,  a  Scotch  minister,  the 
advantages  of  a  servitorship,  by  which  a  poor  scholar  earned 
his  living  and  his  education  by  menial  services  given  during 
part  of  every  day.  Two  servitors  of  his  own  College  attained 
great  eminence  last  century,  though  an  eminence  of  a  very 
different  kind.  One  was  Whitefield,  the  famous  Methodist 
preacher,  and  the  other  Moore,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury. 


1  Chore,  which  is  of  the  same  root  as  char  in  charwoman,  is  used  to 
describe  the  odd  jobs  about  a  house  which  are  properly  done  by  a  man. 
It  is  never  applied  to  the  work  done  by  a  charwoman.  By  Shake- 
speare (I  follow  Johnson's  edition)  chore  is  used  of  woman's  work :  — 
"The  maid  that  milks  and  does  the  meanest  chores."  Anthony  and 
Cleopatra,  Act  IV.,  Sc.  15. 
o 


194  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Each   of    them  might  proudly  have   said  with  the  King's 

son:  — 

"  Some  kinds  of  labour 
Are  nobly  undergone,  and  most  base  matters 
Point  to  rich  ends." 

I  was  told  in  my  undergraduate  days,  but  I  do  not  know 
whether  there  is  any  truth  in  the  story,  that  it  was  the  Earl 
of  Derby,  afterwards  Chancellor  of  the  University  and  Prime 
Minister,  who  gave  the  system  of  servitorships  the  blow  of 
which  it  died.  When  he  was  a  gentleman-commoner  of 
Christ  Church  he  refused,  it  was  said,  to  be  waited  on  by 
his  fellow-undergraduates.  Dean  Liddell  informs  me  "that 
in  1830,  when  he  first  went  up  to  Christ  Church,  the  Junior 
Servitor  used,  immediately  after  grace  had  been  said,  to  walk 
up  to  the  High  Table  with  a  sauce-boat.  This  was  of  course 
a  relic  of  the  old  custom."  In  Exeter  College,  less  than  half 
a  century  ago,  the  Bible-clerk1  dined  off  the  leavings  of  the 
Fellows'  Table.  He  used  to  come  late  to  dinner,  hitting  off 
the  time  when  the  joint  was  likely  to  be  done  with,  and 
could  be  sent  down  to  him. 

Goldsmith,  who  had  too  often  suffered  humiliation,  and  who 
felt  its  bitterness  to  the  full,  had  raised  his  voice  against  the 
system.  "Surely,"  he  wrote,  "pride  itself  has  dictated  to  the 
Fellows  of  our  Colleges  the  absurd  passion  of  being  attended 
at  meals,  and  on  other  public  occasions,  by  those  poor  men 
who,  willing  to  be  scholars,  come  in  upon  some  charitable 

1  "  The  Bible-clerk  had  the  duty  of  reading  the  lessons  in  chapel  and  of 
saying  grace  in  Hall."  Dr.  Murray's  Dictionary.  In  my  College  the 
Bible-clerks — there  were  two  of  them  —  did  not  read  the  lessons.  In 
Chapel  they  kept  the  list  each  service  of  those  who  were  present.  In  Hall 
they  said  grace.  They  were  on  an  equality  with  the  rest  of  the  under- 
graduates. 


XL  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  195 

foundation.  It  implies  a  contradiction  for  men  to  be  at  once 
learning  the  liberal  arts,  and  at  the  same  time  treated  as  slaves  ; 
at  once  studying  freedom  and  practising  servitude."1  He 
forgot  that  often  it  was  the  case,  if  not  indeed  always,  that  the 
charitable  foundation  in  itself  was  not  sufficient  to  support 
and  educate  these  poor  men.  Like  many  a  needy  student 
outside  a  university,  for  part  of  each  day  they  had  to  work  for 
their  living.  Whitefield  had  been  a  servant  in  his  mother's 
inn  at  Gloucester  —  the  inn  whose  praises  are  sounded  in 
Tom  Jones.  When  he  came  to  Pembroke  College  he  was 
still  a  servant,  but  he  was  a  student  also.  It  is  doubtful 
whether  poor  scholars  were  not  greatly  wronged  by  a  change 
which  was  meant  to  give  them  freedom.  The  funds  which 
supported  them,  now  that  the  badge  of  servitude  was  re- 
moved, were  far  too  commonly  competed  for  in  examina- 
tions by  all  alike,  and  far  too  often  fell  to  the  lot  of  the 
well-to-do.  In  the  long  training  needed  for  the  athletics 
of  the  class-room,  money  is  of  great  service,  for  by  money 
the  services  of  the  most  skilful  trainers  are  secured.  The 
poor  man  righting  with  difficulties  may  get  the  better  edu- 
cation for  the  great  main  of  life;  but  through  the  narrow 
straits  of  the  examination-room  the  son  of  the  rich  man, 
unless  his  industry  has  been  sapped  by  wealth,  is  often  borne 
along  in  triumph.  "As  many  a  poor  man  has  worked  his 
passage  over  the  sea  to  some  settlement  where  a  freer  and 
a  larger  life  awaited  him,  so  by  a  servitorship  has  many  a 
man  worked  his  way  from  a  life  of  low  drudgery  to  some  high 
and  honourable  calling.  The  student-servant  is  no  longer  to 
be  found  at  Oxford.  But  the  poor  student  who,  in  his  eager- 

1  An  Enquiry  into  the  Present  State  of  Polite  Learning  in  Europe, 
Chap.  13. 


196  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

ness  to  fight  his  way  by  his  learning,  is  ready  for  any  duty, 
however  humble  it  may  be,  finds  one  way  barred  to  him  that 
was  open  to  the  men  of  former  generations. "  *  I  knew  a  young 
man  who  supported  himself  and  his  widowed  mother  by  the 
humblest  kind  of  work  in  a  large  factory.  By  great  self-denial 
he  had  got  together  a  well-selected  library  of  five  or  six  hun- 
dred volumes.  In  philosophy  his  knowledge  was  surprisingly 
great,  considering  the  difficulties  against  which  all  his  life  he 
had  struggled.  In  some  parts  of  the  Natural  Sciences  he  was 
deeply  interested.  When,  on  a  visit  to  Oxford,  he  was  taken 
into  one  of  the  lecture-rooms  at  the  Museum,  he  sat  down  on 
a  bench,  and  looking  about  him,  after  a  pause  said  that  there 
was  no  sacrifice  that  he  would  not  make  could  he  sit  there  as 
a  learner.  "How  gladly,"  he  exclaimed,  "would  I  sweep 
out  these  rooms,  if  I  could  thereby  get  a  right  to  sit  on  these 
benches."  There  was  indeed  no  honest  service  that  he  would 
not  cheerfully  have  rendered  could  he  thereby  have  supported 
himself  as  an  Oxford  student.  "Gladly  wolde  he  learne." 
Inquiry  was  made  on  all  sides,  but  with  all  the  wealth  of  the 
University  there  was  no  opening  for  such  a  man. 

At  Yale  I  was  told  of  a  fund  of  money  which,  not  many 
years  ago,  had  been  placed  in  the  hands  of  one  of  the  Pro- 
fessors by  a  wealthy  man,  as  a  memorial  to  a  son  who  had  died 
in  his  undergraduate  days.  It  was  to  be  used  in  the  relief  of 
needy  but  meritorious  students.  The  Professor  sent  for  one 
of  the  most  promising  of  his  men,  an  Irishman  and  a  Roman 
Catholic,  who  was,  he  knew,  very  poor.  The  young  man, 
when  assistance  was  offered  him,  nobly  replied  that  there  were 
others  who  stood  in  greater  need  than  he  did,  for  he  had  regu- 

1 1  am  quoting  a  book  which  I  published  in  1878  under  the  title  of  Dr. 
Johnson  :  His  Friends  and  His  Critics,  p.  30. 


XL  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  197 

lar  employment, —  enough  to  make  the  two  ends  meet.  He 
rose  every  morning  at  four  o'clock,  and  went  to  a  newspaper 
office,  where  he  was  engaged  in  the  delivery  of  the  papers. 
The  Professor  pointed  out  to  him  that  such  work  as  this 
lessened  his  strength  for  his  studies,  and  so  at  last  he  induced 
him  to  take  the  money.  At  the  end  of  his  University  course, 
he  came  out  the  first  man  of  his  year.  The  same  Professor, 
who  had  spent  part  of  the  summer  vacation  in  an  hotel  on  the 
mountains,  told  me  that  one  morning  rising  early  he  came 
across  a  youth  who  was  the  night-watchman  and  shoe-black  of 
the  house.  Falling  into  talk  with  him,  he  learnt  that  he  was 
a  student  of  one  of  the  Western  colleges.  On  being  asked 
for  the  first  line  of  the  sEneid,  he  readily  gave  it.  The  first 
line  of  the  Iliad  he  did  not  know,  for  as  yet  in  his  Greek  he 
had  not  gone  beyond  the  New  Testament.  In  his  night-watch 
he  had  his  hourly  rounds  to  make,  one  or  two  furnaces  to  look 
after;  in  the  morning  he  had  the  shoes  to  clean.  In  the 
intervals  of  work  he  had  time  enough  left  for  the  vacation  task 
which  had  been  set  his  class  —  the  perusal  of  four  novels,  two 
of  which  were  Esmond  and  Dombey  and  Son.  At  the  Chicago 
Exhibition  my  friend  the  Professor  found  out  that  a  Bath- 
chairman  whom  he  employed  was  a  university  student.  An- 
other Yale  Professor  told  me  that  in  his  undergraduate  days 
"ability  and  good-fellowship  were  the  qualities  which  did 
most  to  make  a  student  generally  popular.  There  was  a  small 
set  of  poor  men,  distinguished  by  their  ability,  into  which  the 
richest  men  would  have  been  proud  to  enter."  At  the  pre- 
sent time  I  fear  that  both  at  Yale  and  Harvard  excellence  in 
athletic  sports  would  outweigh  with  many  of  these  men  even 
ability  and  good-fellowship. 

Out  of  regard  to  the  convenience  of  the  poor  students,  the 


198  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Long  Vacation  down  to  the  year  1869  came  in  the  winter. 
"The  longest  vacation,"  wrote  Ticknor,  in  1825,  "should 
happen  in  the  hot  season,  when  insubordination  and  miscon- 
duct are  now  most  frequent,  partly  from  the  indolence  pro- 
duced by  the  season.  There  is  a  reason  against  this,  I  know, 
—  the  poverty  of  many  students  who  keep  school  for  a  part  of 
their  subsistence."1  It  was  in  the  winter  that  the  children 
attended  school.  In  the  summer  they  were,  no  doubt,  em- 
ployed on  the  farms.  Even  at  the  present  day,  in  New  Eng- 
land, the  village  schools  are  commonly  closed  from  about  the 
middle  of  June  to  the  middle  of  September.  A  Plan  for  the 
Distribution  of  the  Tutors*  Work  and  Service,  drawn  up  in 
1766,  gives  a  curious  insight  not  only  into  the  poverty  of  some 
of  the  students,  but  into  a  mode  of  life  altogether  different 
from  that  which  now  prevails.  It  was  proposed  "that,  to 
prevent  the  great  inconvenience  attending  some  of  the  scholars 
going  home  at  one  time  and  some  at  another,  in  the  spring 
and  fall,  to  procure  clothing,  there  shall  be  a  short  vacation  in 
the  spring  and  fall."2  The  clothing  which  they  went  to  pro- 
cure no  doubt  had  been  spun  and  woven  on  their  fathers' 
farms. 

By  the  substitution  in  recent  years  of  the  summer  for  the 
winter  as  the  time  of  the  Long  Vacation,  the  poor  but  indus- 
trious student  has  gained  more  than  he  has  lost.  I  was  one 
day  taken  by  a  friend  into  a  large  hotel  on  the  southern  coast 
of  Cape  Cod  where  the  maid-servants  and  the  waiters  were 
mostly  school-teachers  or  university  students.  Many  of  the 
women  belonged  to  one  of  the  Colleges  where  women- 
students  are  admitted,  and  four  of  the  waiters  were  Harvard 
undergraduates.  The  shoeblack  of  the  year  before  had 

1  Life  of  George  Ticknor,  I.  358.  2  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  498. 


xi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  199 

been  a  medical  student  from  New  York.  This  season  he 
had  earned  his  promotion,  and  was  now  the  bath-room  stew- 
ard. These  young  people  did  their  work  well,  my  friend 
told  me,  and  were  courteously  treated  by  the  guests.  They 
would  not,  he  added,  have  tamely  submitted  to  rudeness. 
They  all  took  their  meals  together,  apart  from  a  lower  class 
of  servants  who  did  the  rough  work  of  the  kitchen  and  scul- 
lery. An  American  lady  told  me  that  sometimes  at  a  winter 
dance  in  Cambridge  or  Boston  a  girl  would  meet  among  the 
guests  a  Harvard  undergraduate  who  had  been  a  waiter  in 
the  hotel  where  she  had  passed  the  summer.  I  asked  her 
what  reception  he  would  have.  It  depended,  she  said,  on 
the  character  of  the  girl.  Most,  having  sense  and  good  feeling 
enough  to  respect  him  for  his  courage  in  earning  his  living, 
would  be  pleased;  some  few  would  be  offended. 

When  I  was  staying  in  a  seaside  village,  I  four  times  took 
a  drive  in  a  hired  carriage.  One  day  my  driver  was  an 
undergraduate  home  for  the  vacation,  and  another  day  a  youth 
who  next  term  was  to  enter  college.  On  the  third  day  I  was 
driven  by  a  man  who  worked  in  a  large  shoe-factory,  and  who 
was  taking  a  week's  holiday.  His  uncle,  he  said,  had  been  a 
Senator  of  Massachusetts.  One  of  his  nephews  had  just  entered 
Brown  University,  and  he  hoped  in  time  to  send  his  own  son 
there  also.  With  one  of  my  companions,  who  was  a  Harvard 
Professor,  he  discussed  the  advantages  and  disadvantages  of 
some  of  the  New  England  Universities. 

In  the  Harvard  Crimson,  as  the  Long  Vacation  was  draw- 
ing near,  there  appeared  from  time  to  time  advertisements  by 
business  firms  offering  employment,  such  as  the  following :  — 

"  Houghton,  Mifflin  and  Co.  are  desirous  of  corresponding 
with  College  men  who  like  employment  through  the  summer." 


200  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

"  A  large  manufacturing  house  wishes  a  brainy  [«V]  young 
man  for  its  office." 

Students,  moreover,  who  were  already  acting  as  agents,  put 
forth  their  advertisements. 

"  YALE'S  DISADVANTAGES.  —  She  has  not  eight  quick  sail  or  rail-and- 

water  routes  to  the  World's  Fair,  as  I  have.  Stop  at  Washington,  D.C., 

Niagara   Falls,  White   Mts.     $13.60  saved.  Tickets  to  all  points  West. 
Please  call  before  I  leave,  June  20." 

"  HOTEL  SORRENTO,  SORRENTO,  ME.  —  First-class  in  every  re- 
spect —  has  a  beautiful  location,  on  Frenchman's  Bay,  seven  miles  from 
Bar  Harbor.  SPECIAL  RATES  for  July.  CHARLES  V.  CARTER,  Mang. 
Illustrated  pamphlet  and  terms  of  .  .  .  "  1 

The  Governing  Body  of  Harvard,  in  their  desire  to  bring 
the  University  within  the  reach  of  poor  scholars,  seven  years 
ago  opened  "an  Employment  Bureau  in  the  University  Office. 
All  needy  students  are  encouraged  to  seek  through  this 
agency  for  opportunities  to  earn  money.  As  the  Bureau 
extends  its  services  to  those  who  are  about  to  take  degrees 
in  Arts  and  Sciences,  and  as  it  is  able  to  secure  permanent 
positions  for  the  great  majority  of  those  who  are  graduated 
with  good  standing,  men  of  small  means  feel  more  confidence 
in  their  future,  and  less  dread  of  being  unable  to  repay  loans 
and  advances  to  those  who  are  encouraging  them  in  securing 
a  College  education."  2 

There  are  usually  about  two  hundred  names  on  the  books  of 
the  Bureau.  From  the  letters  of  the  poor  students  I  have 
extracted  the  following  account  of  the  ways  by  which  money 
is  earned :  — 

"  Teaching  a  private  school  and  giving  lessons  in  German  to  students  in 
the  College." 

1 1  have  suppressed  the  names  and  addresses  of  these  two  advertisers. 
2  Student?  Expenses,  p.  5. 


xi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  201 

"  Officiating  in  a  small  congregation." 

"  Lecturing  and  writing  for  papers." 

"  Waiting  on  table, l  teaching  night-school,  tutoring,  singing,  and  by  at 
least  a  dozen  other  business  schemes." 

"  Tending  the  furnaces  in  the  house  where  I  roomed." 

"  Gardening." 

"  Index-making." 

"  Laboratory  assistant." 

"  Clerk  in  a  summer  hotel." 

"Clerk  in  Memorial  Hall." 

"  Porter  in  a  summer  hotel." 

"  Publishing  notes,  waiting  on  tables,  type-writing,  outside  jobs,  as  post- 
ing bills,  copying,  etc." 

"  Odd  jobs,  publishing  placards,  advertising  scheme,  teaching  school, 
publishing  books." 

The  notes  which  one  of  these  students  published  were  no 
doubt  those  which  he  had  taken  down  in  the  lecture  room. 
The  Dean  of  the  College  in  his  Report  for  1892-93,  speaking 
of  that  temptation  which  besets  lazy  students  everywhere  to 
do  no  work  until  just  before  an  examination,  says :  "  If  they 
were  then  left  to  themselves,  they  might  learn  the  consequence 
of  idleness  and  teach  it  to  their  successors;  but,  unhappily, 
their  demands  have  created  a  supply  of  wage-earners  who  sell 
notes,  make  a  careful  study  of  the  questions  likely  to  occur 
and  recur  in  large  elementary  courses,  hold,  on  the  night 
before  an  examination,  'seminars'  in  which  they  review,  at 
one,  two,  or  three  dollars  a  ticket,  the  work  of  a  half-year, 
and  in  general  abet  idle  students  in  shirking  their  daily  duty." 
At  Harvard,  as  at  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  the  orthodox  race 
of  "crammers"  or  "coaches"  flourishes,  composed  entirely  of 
graduates  who  have  acquired  a  great  dexterity  in  driving  know- 
ledge into  heads  not  always  intended  by  nature  to  receive  it. 

1  In  America  the  servant  waits  on  table;  in  England,  at  table. 


202  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

The  following  advertisement  I  cut  out  of  the  Harvard  Crim- 
son :  — 

"  History  12  Review.  —  The  course  will  be  reviewed  in  Manter  [a 
Block  of  Rooms]  at  2  to-day  as  follows:  English  History  from  1760  to 
1837,  at  2  P'm-J  English  History  from  1837,  and  Continental  History  at 
7.15  p.m.  Fee  for  each  review,  $4  [i6j.  4</.].  Gentlemen  will  confer  a 
favour  by  not  opening  accounts  for  reviews." 

In  the  last  paragraph  it  is  delicately  implied  that  the  four 
dollars  must  be  paid  before  the  "review"  begins.  With  such 
men  as  these  the  Dean  does  not  attempt  to  deal.  Indeed,  he 
admits  that  in  certain  cases  they  have  their  use.  The  under- 
graduates who  traffic  in  notes  he  would  suppress  so  far  as  he 
can.  " Students  engaged  in  illegitimate  coaching,"  he  says, 
"should  receive  no  scholarship  or  other  pecuniary  aid;  for, 
however  studious  they  may  be,  however  resolute  in  educating 
themselves,  however  temperate  in  their  private  life,  they  are 
—  directly  or  indirectly,  consciously  or  unconsciously  — 
enemies  to  College  learning,  College  morality,  and  College 
honour."1 

One  of  the  poor  students,  describing  his  trials  as  a  Fresh- 
man, says :  "  Part  of  this  year  I  was  very  poor.  My  washing 
I  did  myself.  About  mid-year  I  was  so  short  of  money  that 
for  nearly  two  months  I  ate  but  one  or  two  meals  a  day.  This 
was  the  hardest  period  of  my  course,  but  rather  incited  than 
discouraged  me."  In  spite  of  all  he  went  through,  he  ends 
by  saying:  "My  health,  when  I  entered,  was  very  poor.  I 
left  College  strong  in  body,  better  than  at  any  time  for  ten 
years.  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  an  economical 
student  can  get  through  honourably  and  happily  for  three 
hundred  dollars  a  year  [^61.6.0]." 2  "A  poor  student's 

1  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  103.  2  Students'  Expenses,  p.  43. 


xi.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  203 

berth,"  writes  another  man,  "is  not  exactly  a  bed  of  roses,  but 
I  know  that  a  sober-minded,  industrious  man  can  study  in 
Harvard  College,  and  not  only  exist,  but  have  an  enjoyable 
time  on  four  hundred  dollars  a  year  [^81.15.0]."  l  A  third 
writer  says:  "A  bright  scholar  or  a  shrewd  business  fellow 
can  entirely  pay  his  expenses  at  Harvard;  but  it  is  no  place 
for  a  poor  scholar  or  a  lazy  man."  2 

There  is  a  danger  lest,  in  this  sharp  struggle  for  existence 
in  a  university,  somewhat  too  much  of  "  the  shrewd  business 
fellow  "  may  be  brought  out  in  a  youth's  character.  Almost  all 
these  ways  of  earning  money  are  honourable;  but  the  adver- 
tising scheme  is  unworthy  of  a  student.  I  do  not  like  the  puff 
of  the  young  man  who  heads  his  advertisement,  "YALE'S  DIS- 
ADVANTAGES." Such  a  heading  would,  no  doubt,  catch  the  eye 
of  a  Harvard  man;  but  it  would  little  please  him  to  know 
that  in  his  own  University  a  race  of  young  Barnums  is  grow- 
ing up. 

In  the  Boston  Sunday  Globe  for  December  31,  1893,  "a 
Poor  Student  at  Harvard"  published  his  Memoirs.  He  is 
apparently  still  at  College,  so  that  a  supplementary  chapter 
will  some  day  have  to  be  added.  His  father  works  in  a  fac- 
tory, earning  about  nine  dollars  (^1.16.9)  a  week.  The 
son  entered  Harvard  with  a  capital  of  twenty-seven  dollars 
(^5.10.3),  all  that  was  left  over,  after  he  had  paid  his  debts, 
of  his  earnings  in  the  summer  as  a  waiter  in  a  mountain  hotel. 
He  hired  a  room  thirteen  feet  long  by  seven  wide.  At  first 
he  spent  on  his  food  no  more  than  one  dollar  and  fifteen 
cents  a  week  (43.10^.).  "I  remembered,"  he  writes,  "how 
Garfield  had  lived  for  thirty-three  cents  [is.4^d.]  a  week  on 
milk.  I  felt  sure  if  he  could,  I  could."  He  soon  found  that 

1  Students'  Expenses,  p.  22.  a  Ib.  p.  26. 


204  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

his  health  was  sinking  under  the  spare  diet,  and  that  he  was 
becoming  unfit  for  work.  He  took  a  better  dinner,  and  so 
raised  his  expenditure  to  two  dollars  and  sixty-five  cents  a 
week  [ios.io|d.].  "It  kept  me  well;  only  I  would  get  awfully 
hungry  every  night  at  about  ten  o'clock.  I  used  to  drink 
water  for  that."  He  at  once  set  about  earning  money,  and 
before  long  was  made  one  of  the  waiters  at  the  Foxcrof t  Club. 
He  suffered  from  the  humiliation  of  his  position.  "I  felt 
that  there  was  a  sort  of  feeling  against  me  by  many,  and  it 
grated  against  my  pride  to  be  at  the  absolute  mercy  of  some 
of  the  men  there.  I  have  always  thought  that  some  knew  just 
how  I  felt,  and  rather  added  to  my  discomfort  in  all  the  ways 
they  could."  He  does  not,  however,  give  any  instance  of 
insolence  or  unkindness.  A  man  in  such  a  position  as  his 
is  apt  to  see  "the  proud  man's  contumely"  even  where  there 
is  none.  He  was  too  poor  to  pay  for  a  laundress,  and  had  to 
keep  his  soiled  linen  till  Thanksgiving  Day,  when  he  took  it 
home  and  had  it  washed  there.  When  his  clean  clothes  came 
to  an  end  he  wore  a  jersey.  "This,  of  course,  caused  re- 
marks, which  I  felt  very  deeply,  but  I  went  on  my  way  with  a 
heightened  colour,  but  still  with  a  feeling  that  I  was  doing 
what  was  right." 

In  his  vacations  he  got  work  as  a  druggist's  assistant,  as 
head-waiter,  and  afterwards  as  manager  in  a  summer  hotel, 
and  as  bookkeeper  in  a  shoe-factory.  He  and  one  of  his 
comrades  were  engaged  one  summer  by  a  firm  of  publishers 
to  sell  books.  "  We  were  given  a  large  city  several  hundred 
miles  away.  We  started  in  high  feather;  we  walked  and 
tramped  the  streets  for  a  week,  and  I  never  sold  one.  My 
partner  sold  three,  but  two  days  later  they  all  countermanded 
their  orders.  That  was  the  last  straw, —  we  quit."  It  was,  I 


XI.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  205 

suspected,  an  undergraduate  who,  one  day  when  I  was  sitting 
under  the  veranda  of  a  house  at  a  seaside  village  on  Cape 
Cod,  asked  me  to  buy,  first  some  books  and  then  some  scents. 
He  asked  but  once,  and  went  away  the  moment  I  refused. 
By  his  looks  and  his  gentle  manners,  he  seemed  far  too  good 
for  so  bad  a  trade.  A  man  can  pay  too  dearly  even  for  a 
university  education.  The  "  Poor  Student "  in  term-time  got 
various  kinds  of  employment.  He  canvassed  for  more  than 
one  election;  he  worked  in  a  lawyer's  office;  he  read  proofs, 
and  he  was  an  author's  copyist.  This  last  piece  of  work 
extended  into  the  vacation.  In  term-time  he  used  to  begin 
work  with  the  author  at  ten  at  night,  and  kept  on  at  it  till  an 
hour  and  a  half  after  midnight;  all  through  the  vacation  he 
was  employed  from  twelve  to  fifteen  hours  a  day.  When  this 
heavy  task  came  to  an  end  he  got  an  engagement  on  a  news- 
paper as  the  Harvard  correspondent.  "It  was  the  busiest 
time  of  the  year.  Two  things  had  to  be  followed  daily, —  base- 
ball and  rowing.  It  really  took  all  my  day  from  three  in  the 
afternoon.  It  was  just  the  time  of  the  year  when  I  needed 
every  hour  on  my  College  work.  The  examinations  were  at 
hand.  But  there  was  no  help  for  it."  He  has  gone  through 
the  main  part  of  the  struggle,  he  says,  and  now  makes  enough 
money  to  be  able  to  indulge  in  a  few  comforts.  He  has  no 
longer  to  try  to  endure  a  New  England  winter  in  a  fireless 
room.  When  the  thermometer  fell  below  zero  he  had  been 
forced  to  order  a  supply  of  coal.  He  laments  that  his  studies 
have  suffered  greatly  from  the  need  that  he  has  always  been 
under  to  give  so  much  of  his  strength  and  time  to  earning 
his  bread.  "But,"  he  adds,  "I  have  more  than  ten  times 
overbalanced  that  by  the  practical  knowledge  that  comes 
only  by  actual  personal  experience.  When  I  get  through 


206  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Harvard  there'll  be  no  such  thing  as  my  'going  out  into  the 
world.'  " 

Many  of  the  wealthy  students  are  ready  enough  to  help  their 
needy  comrades.  "Rich  men,"  wrote  the  Dean  of  the  Col- 
lege in  1892,  "even  rich  undergraduates,  answer  cheerfully  a 
call  for  money;  but  generosity  of  this  sort  tends  to  pauperize 
such  students  as  take  kindly  to  pauperizing.  Something  has 
been  accomplished  by  a  sort  of  floating  loan-fund.  Money 
for  the  student  is  put  into  the  hands  of  the  Dean,  who  gives 
the  student  to  understand  that,  as  soon  as  it  is  returned,  it 
will  be  lent  to  some  other  student  equally  in  need.  The 
obligation  thus  involved  is  thought  to  be  more  effective  than 
a  written  promise  to  pay,  which  seems  of  itself  a  sort  of  quid 
pro  quo"  l 

It  is  not  only  on  his  earnings  that  the  poor  scholar  has  to 
depend.  Just  as  we  have  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge  endow- 
ments for  scholarships  and  exhibitions,  so  Harvard  is  in  pos- 
session of  large  funds  for  distribution  as  "money-aids  to 
students.  Merit  and  need  are  the  elements  which  determine 
distribution."2  No  money  is  given,  as  it  is  so  abundantly 
given  in  the  great  English  Universities,  to  merit  alone,  how- 
ever great  it  may  be.  The  merit  of  the  wealthy  student  is  at 
Harvard  rewarded  only  by  honour;  but  even  honour  will  not 
always  stir  him  up.  "It  is  an  interesting  inquiry,"  writes  the 
President,  "how  the  College  can  supply  the  rich  young  man 
with  an  appropriate  stimulus  to  do  his  best.  The  problem, 
however,  is  one  which  does  not  vex  Harvard  College  alone ; 
it  has  long  vexed  rich  parents  and  civilized  society."  8  When 

1  Annual  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  88. 

2  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  7. 
8  Annual  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  21. 


XI.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  207 

Lord  Southampton  asked  Bishop  Watson  of  Llandaff,  "how 
he  was  to  bring  up  his  son  so  as  to  make  him  get  forward  in 
the  world,  '  I  know  of  but  one  way,'  replied  the  Bishop;  '  give 
him  parts  and  poverty. '  '  Well,  then, '  replied  Lord  Southamp- 
ton, '  if  God  has  given  him  parts,  I  will  manage  as  to  the 
poverty.'"1  Poverty  at  Harvard,  however  great,  without  at 
all  events  some  parts,  is  not  looked  upon  as  a  title  to  relief. 
Those  only  are  to  be  helped  who  are  worthy  of  receiving  a 
liberal  education.  In  1887  about  fifty  thousand  dollars 
(^10,225)  were  thus  distributed;  by  1893  the  fund  had  in- 
creased to  eighty-nine  thousand  (^18,200.)  By  such  leaps 
and  bounds  does  munificence  advance  in  the  United  States. 
Even  this  large  sum  can  scarcely  suffice  for  all  the  demands 
of  studious  poverty.  "One-half  the  students,"  writes  a  Har- 
vard Instructor  in  Philosophy,  "must  be  conceived  as  very 
poor,  brought  to  College  by  intellectual  and  practical  ambi- 
tion, working  hard  at  their  books  and  for  their  maintenance, 
and  without  time  or  money  for  much  recreation,  exercise,  or 
society.  This  class,  from  which  the  best  scholars  generally 
come,  is  dubbed '  the  grinds. '  "  2  They  are  like  the  men  whom 
Arthur  Pendennis  despised,  who  every  afternoon  were  to  be 
seen  in  their  hob-nailed  shoes  trudging  along  the  Trump  ing- 
ton  Road. 

Of  the  well-to-do  students  the  expenses  seem  to  be  higher 
even  than  at  Oxford.  How  much  they  have  risen  in  the  last 
fifty  years  is  shown  by  the  following  passage  in  the  Life  of 
Charles  Sumner.*  "  His  College  bills  did  not  exceed  the 
average  bills  of  his  Class.  Including  instruction,  board  in 
commons,  rent  and  charge  of  room,  fuel,  use  of  class-books 

1  H.  C.  Robinson's  Diary,  I.  337. 

2  Educational  Review,  April,  1894,  p.  322.  3  Vol.  I.,  p.  53. 


208  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  xi. 

and  other  fees,  they  amounted  for  the  four  years  to  less  than 
eight  hundred  dollars  [^163],  which  is  now  quite  a  mode- 
rate expenditure  for  a  single  year."  An  undergraduate  may 
still  live  in  great  comfort  at  Oxford  on  two  hundred  pounds 
a  year,  even  though  out  of  this  sum  he  has  to  defray  his  out- 
lay on  clothes,  amusements,  and  travelling. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

From  a  College  to  a  University. — George  Ticknor. — Influence  of  Ger- 
many. —  Oxford  Colleges  Forty  Years  Ago.  —  Provincialism.  —  Founda- 
tion of  New  Schools  at  Harvard.  —  Duties  of  Professors. 

THOUGH  Harvard  College  had  from  the  beginning  been 
a  university,  in  that  it  was  a  place  where  the  arts  and 
sciences  were  studied  and  where  degrees  were  conferred,  yet 
it  was  a  university  after  the  later  English,  and  not  after  the 
continental  manner.  It  did  not  freely  impart  knowledge  to  all 
who  sought  it  in  all  the  great  departments  of  learning.  It 
bound  down  the  students  to  a  certain  limited  course ;  it  con- 
fined them  to  a  four  years'  track  to  be  beaten  by  all  alike. 
Along  this  track  all  moved  at  the  same  pace  —  the  quick  kept 
back  by  the  slow,  the  hard  workers  by  the  idlers.  There  was 
not  that  choice  between  classics  and  mathematics  which,  even 
under  the  early  examination  schemes  at  Oxford,  was  allowed 
to  a  certain  extent ;  neither  was  there  that  separation  made 
between  passmen  and  classmen1  in  the  college  lectures  by 
which  the  abler  students  were  carried  over  a  far  wider  field. 
Everywhere  there  was  a  dead  level,  a  dreary  uniformity.  Down 
to  the  year  1767  each  tutor  had  taught  every  subject  to  the 
Class  assigned  to  him,  throughout  the  whole  course.  In 
that  year  a  change  was  made,  and  henceforth  Greek,  Latin, 

1  Classmen  or  Honours-men  at  Oxford  correspond  to  those  who  at  Har- 
vard take  their  degree  cum  laude,  magna  cum  laude,  summa  cum  laude. 
P  209 


210  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

philosophy  and  mathematics  were  assigned  each  to  a  single 
teacher.1  The  tutors  were  no  doubt  for  the  most  part  sound 
scholars  of  the  old  narrow  school  —  much  the  same  kind  of 
men  as  the  masters  of  the  English  grammar  schools  and  the 
Fellows  of  the  Oxford  and  Cambridge  Colleges.  Among  them, 
however,  had  never  risen  a  Bentley  or  a  Person,  not  even  a 
Markland  or  a  Parr,  to  set  and  to  keep  the  standard  of  scholar- 
ship high.  Greek  must  have  been  but  little  studied,  for,  accord- 
ing to  Ticknor,  in  the  early  years  of  the  present  century,  "  a 
copy  of  Euripides  in  the  original  could  not  be  bought  at  any 
bookseller's  shop  in  New  England." 2  He  had  been  educated 
at  Dartmouth  College  —  Daniel  Webster's  College.  "  It  is, 
Sir,  a  small  College ;  and  yet  there  are  those  who  love  it,"  said 
that  great  advocate,  with  his  eyes  full  of  tears,  when  upholding 
its  charter  before  the  Supreme  Court.  Ticknor  had  afterwards 
studied  privately  under  a  good  scholar,  an  Englishman,  who 
had  been  taught  by  Dr.  Parr.  On  leaving  him,  he  entered  a 
lawyer's  office,  but  his  heart  was  not  in  his  work.  In  the  year 
1814,  when  he  was  two  and  twenty,  he  chanced  to  read  a 
defence  of  the  University  of  Gottingen  that  had  been  written 
"  against  the  ill-intentions  of  Jerome  Bonaparte."  He  had 
never  before  known  the  true  nature  of  a  university.  "  My 
astonishment  at  these  revelations,"  he  writes,  "  was  increased 
by  an  account  of  its  library,  given  by  an  Englishman  who  had 
been  there.  I  was  sure  that  I  should  like  to  study  at  such  a 
university,  but  it  was  in  vain  that  I  endeavoured  to  get  further 
knowledge  upon  the  subject.  I  would  gladly  have  prepared 
for  it  by  learning  German,  but  there  was  no  one  in  Boston  who 
could  teach  me.  Nor  was  it  possible  to  get  books.  I  bor- 
rowed a  Meidinger's  Grammar,  French  and  German,  from  my 

*  Quincy's  Harvard,   II.  132.  2  Life  of  W.  H.  Prescott,  p.  8. 


xii.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  211 

friend,  Mr.  Everett,  and  sent  to  New  Hampshire,  where  I 
knew  there  was  a  German  Dictionary,  and  procured  it.  I  also 
obtained  a  copy  of  Goethe's  Werther  (through  Mr.  Shaw's 
connivance)  from  amongst  Mr.  J.  Q.  Adams's  books  deposited 
by  him,  on  going  to  Europe,  in  the  Athenaeum." l  Neverthe- 
less, in  all  this  dearth  of  Greek  and  German  books  Boston  was 
known  as  "  The  Literary  Emporium." 2  Judge  Story,  writing 
of  Harvard  as  he  had  known  it  in  the  last  years  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  says  :  "  The  intercourse  between  us  and  foreign 
countries  was  infrequent ;  and  except  to  English  literature  and 
science,  I  might  almost  say,  we  had  no  means  of  access.  Even 
in  respect  to  them  we  had  little  more  than  a  semi-annual 
importation  of  the  most  common  works.  Two  ships  only  plied 
as  regular  packets  between  Boston  and  London,  one  in  the 
spring  and  the  other  in  the  autumn,  and  their  arrival  was  an 
era  in  our  college  life." 3  Ticknor's  father,  a  well-to-do  Boston 
grocer,  who,  like  Ticknor  himself,  had  passed  through  Dart- 
mouth College  and  had  a  respect  for  learning,  allowed  his  son 
to  give  up  the  law  and  to  go  and  study  at  Gottingen. 

It  was  a  great  day  in  the  history  of  Harvard  when  this  young 
Bostonian  set  out  to  explore  a  German  university.  On  Novem- 
ber 10,  1815,  he  wrote  to  his  father  from'  Gottingen  of  his 
Greek  tutor,  Dr.  Schultze  :  "  Every  day  I  am  filled  with  new 
astonishment  at  the  variety  and  accuracy,  the  minuteness  and 
readiness,  of  his  learning.  Every  day  I  feel  anew,  under  the 
oppressive  weight  of  his  admirable  acquirements,  what  a  morti- 
fying distance  there  is  between  a  European  and  an  American 

1  Life  of  George  Ticknor,  I.  n. 

2  At  all  events,  a  few  years  later  it  was  frequently  so  called.     Life  of 
H.  W.  Longfellow,  I.  37. 

8  Life  of  Joseph  Story,  I.  48. 


212  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

scholar  !  We  do  not  yet  know  what  a  Greek  scholar  is ;  we  do 
not  even  know  the  process  by  which  a  man  is  to  be  made  one. 
Dr.  Schultze  is  hardly  older  than  I  am.  It  never  entered  into 
my  imagination  to  conceive  that  any  expense  of  time  or  talent 
could  make  a  man  so  accomplished  in  this  forgotten  language 
as  he  is."  l  For  the  first  time  in  his  life,  something  beyond  a 
mere  collection  of  books,  a  library  fit  for  scholars  was  opened 
to  the  young  American.  He  had,  moreover,  at  his  service  a 
large  staff  of  able  and  learned  Professors.  "  At  least  seventy 
or  eighty  different  courses  of  lectures,"  he  wrote,  "  are  going  on 
at  the  same  time."  Some  of  the  Professors  were  poor  enough, 
for  the  miseries  caused  by  the  great  wars  still  overhung  the 
land.  One  of  them  told  him  "  that  when  Germany  was  thus 
impoverished,  if  a  Professor  at  Jena  appeared  in  his  lecture- 
room  with  a  new  waistcoat,  the  students  applauded  him; 
being  asked  what  occurred  if  a  new  coat  made  its  appearance, 
he  exclaimed :  '  Gott  bewahre  !  such  a  thing  never  hap- 
pened.' "  2  Ticknor  was  struck  with  "  the  accuracy  with  which 
time  is  measured  and  sold  by  the  Professors.  Every  clock  that 
strikes  is  the  signal  for  four  or  five  lectures  to  begin  and  four 
or  five  others  to  close.  In  the  intervals  you  may  go  into  the 
streets  and  find  they  are  silent  and  empty ;  but  the  bell  has 
hardly  told  the  hour  before  they  are  filled  with  students,  with 
their  portfolios  under  their  arms,  hastening  from  the  feet  of  one 
Gamaliel  to  those  of  another  —  generally  running  in  order  to 
save  time,  and  often  without  a  hat.  As  soon  as  they  reach  the 
room  they  take  their  places  and  prepare  their  pens  and  paper. 
The  Professor  comes  in  almost  immediately,  and  from  that 
time  till  he  goes  out  the  sound  of  his  disciples  taking  notes 
does  not  for  an  instant  cease."3 

1  Life  of  Ticknor,  I.  73.  *Ib.I.  280.  8  Ib.  I.  82. 


XII.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  213 

Ticknor  had  been  studying  at  Gottingen  little  more  than  a 
year  when  he  received  from  Harvard  the  offer  of  the  Smith 
Professorship  of  the  French  and  Spanish  Languages  and  Litera- 
ture, and  the  College  Professorship  of  the  Belles-Lettres.1  He 
was  to  stay  on  in  Europe  for  some  time  longer  to  complete  his 
education.  He  stayed  four  years  in  all,  studying  in  Germany, 
France,  Italy,  and  Spain.  One  lesson  the  future  Professor 
learned  in  a  talk  with  Goethe,  on  whom  he  called  when  passing 
through  Weimar.  "  Once  Goethe's  genius  kindled,  and  in  spite 
of  himself  he  grew  almost  fervent  as  he  deplored  the  want  of 
extemporary  eloquence  in  Germany,  and  said  that  the  English 
is  kept  a  much  more  living  language  by  its  influence.  '  Here,' 
he  said,  '  we  have  no  eloquence  —  our  preaching  is  a  monoto- 
nous, middling  declamation  —  public  debate  we  have  not  at 
all,  and  if  a  little  inspiration  sometimes  comes  to  us  in  our 
lecture-rooms,  it  is  out  of  place,  for  eloquence  does  not  teach.'  "  2 
Ticknor  was  but  eight  and  twenty  when  he  returned  to  America, 
and  entered  on  his  new  duties  at  Harvard.  On  August  10, 
1819,  he  delivered  his  opening  address  in  the  Old  Church  of 
Cambridge  before  "  a  cultivated  audience  "  which  came  together 
"  to  listen  to  the  utterance  of  the  ripest  scholarship  America 
could  then  boast."3  These  are  the  words  of  Ticknor's  bio- 
grapher, George  Hillard,  himself  no  mean  scholar.  America 
surely  can  look  back  with  some  complacency  on  the  advance 
she  has  made  in  learning  since  those  days. 

Ticknor,  though  he  was  by  far  the  most  important,  was  not  the 
first  student  sent  from  the  United  States  to  qualify  himself  for 
a  Professor's  chair.  In  1802,  Benjamin  Silliman  at  the  age  of 
twenty-two  had  been  appointed  Professor  of  Chemistry  and 
Geology  at  Yale.  Of  neither  science  had  he  any  knowledge, 

1  Life  of  Ticknor,  I.  1 1 6,  321 .  2  Ib.  I.  1 14.  8  Ib.  I.  320. 


214  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

but  he  had  distinguished  himself  in  his  mathematical  studies. 
Such  appointments  are  not  unknown  in  the  history  of  English 
Universities.  Last  century  Watson,  afterwards  Bishop  of  Llan- 
daff,  was  appointed  to  the  Chair  of  Chemistry  at  Cambridge. 
He  was  as  ignorant  of  the  science  as  young  Silliman.  Never- 
theless, of  his  Chemical  Essays  Sir  Humphry  Davy  said  that 
"  he  could  scarcely  imagine  a  time  in  which  they  would  be 
superannuated."1  From  the  Chair  of  Chemistry  he  was  trans- 
ferred to  the  Chair  of  Divinity,  of  which  he  knew  no  more 
than  an  ordinary  parson  —  that  is  to  say,  very  little.  By  his 
industry,  however,  he  filled  the  post  not  without  distinction. 
In  the  same  University  seventy-six  years  ago,  Adam  Sedgwick 
was  made  Professor  of  Geology,  though  he  was  as  ignorant  of 
that  science  as  Watson  had  been  of  Chemistry.  He,  too,  justified 
the  appointment.  In  like  manner  in  modern  days  Oxford  has, 
seen  a  retired  naval  captain  appointed  to  a  Professorship  of 
History  over  the  heads  of  Dr.  Stubbs,  Mr.  Freeman,  Mr. 
Froude,  Mr.  Church,  and  Mr.  Pearson.  No  doubt  it  was 
thought  that  with  time  he  would  add  to  his  first  class  and  his 
orthodoxy  a  competent  knowledge  of  the  subject  which  he 
was  advanced  to  teach.  This,  I  believe,  he  has  succeeded  in 
doing.  The  late  Professor  of  Arabic  in  Oxford,  who  had  been 
appointed  with  the  same  ignorance  and  the  same  expectation, 
never  took  the  trouble  to  dispel  the  one  and  to  satisfy  the  other. 
Silliman  made  but  a  short  stay  in  Europe.  For  the  winter 
session  he  studied  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh.  On  his 
return  to  America  he  wrote :  "  A  much  higher  standard  of 
excellence  than  I  had  before  seen  was  presented  to  me,  espe- 
cially in  Edinburgh."  2 

*De  Quincey's  Works,  II.  106. 

*  Life  of  Benjamin  Silliman,  I.  195. 


XII.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  215 

In  1825,  six  years  after  Ticknor  entered  on  his  duties  at 
Harvard,  Longfellow  graduated  at  Bowdoin  College  —  the 
Alma  Mater  not  only  of  him  but  of  Hawthorne.  It  so  hap- 
pened that  at  the  Commencement  at  which  he  took  his  degree, 
the  Board  of  Trustees  voted  to  found  a  Chair  of  Modern  Lan- 
guages. The  young  Bachelor  of  Arts,  who  was  but  eighteen, 
had,  it  is  said,  in  his  examination  pleased  one  of  the  Trustees 
by  his  elegant  translation  of  an  Ode  of  Horace.  An  informal 
proposal  was  made  by  the  Board  to  his  father  that  the  youth 
"  should  visit  Europe,  for  the  purpose  of  fitting  himself  for  his 
position,  with  the  understanding  that  on  his  return  he  should  be 
appointed  to  the  Professorship." *  Accordingly,  he  spent  three 
years  in  France,  Spain,  Italy,  and  Germany.  Like  Ticknor,  he 
studied  in  Gottingen.  On  his  return  at  the  age  of  two  and 
twenty  he  received  the  appointment.  Five  years  later,  on 
Ticknor's  resignation,  he  was  offered  his  Professorship  at  Har- 
vard ;  but  it  was  suggested  to  him  by  the  President  that  he 
would  do  well  "  to  reside  in  Europe,  at  his  own  expense,  a  year 
or  eighteen  months  for  the  purpose  of  a  more  perfect  attain- 
ment of  the  German."  For  eighteen  months  he  studied  the 
Northern  languages  in  Sweden,  Denmark,  Germany,  and  Hol- 
land, and  on  his  return  at  the  age  of  twenty-nine  was  made 
Professor.2 

It  was  "  with  the  vision  of  a  real  University,  where  all  the 
great  divisions  of  human  knowledge  should  be  duly  repre- 
sented and  taught,"  that  Ticknor  "returned  fresh  from  a  two 
years'  residence  at  Gottingen."8  He  was  before  his  time, 
and  he  saw  the  vision  "fade  into  the  light  of  common  day." 
"When  I  came  home  from  Europe,"  he  writes,  "not  having 

1  Life  ofH.  W.  Longfellow,  I.  68.  2  Ib.  I.  203,  243. 

8  Life  of  G.  Ticknor,  II.  422. 


216  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

been  educated  at  Cambridge  [Massachusetts],  and  having 
always  looked  upon  it  with  great  veneration,  I  had  no  misgiv- 
ings about  the  wisdom  of  the  organization  and  management  of 
the  College  there."1  He  soon  discovered  how  great  were  the 
changes  which  were  needed  in  Harvard.  He  set  about  one 
of  the  hardest  of  tasks  that  a  young  man  can  take  upon  him- 
self —  to  teach  teachers,  to  instruct  instructors,  to  convince  a 
University  that  its  time-honoured  system  needs  a  thorough 
reform.  The  President  was  against  him;  almost  all  the  Pro- 
fessors were  against  him;  even  the  students  were  against  him. 
The  President  was  Kirkland,  whom  Lowell  has  so  pleasantly 
described.  "He  was  a  man  of  genius,  but  of  genius  that 
evaded  utilization.  .  .  .  There  was  that  in  the  soft  and 
rounded  (I  had  almost  said  melting)  outlines  of  his  face 
which  reminded  one  of  Chaucer.  ...  He  was  one  of  those , 
misplaced  persons  whose  misfortune  it  is  that  their  lives  over- 
lap two  distinct  eras,  and  are  already  so  impregnated  with  one 
that  they  can  never  be  in  healthy  sympathy  with  the  other."  2 
Ticknor  appealed  to  the  Corporation,  who  consulted  the  whole 
body  of  teachers  about  his  proposals.  A  large  majority  of 
them  steadily  resisted  any  change  of  importance.8  Among 
the  Professors  was  Edward  Everett,  "whose  coming  from 
Germany,"  Emerson  said,  "was  an  immediate  and  profound 
influence  in  New  England  education."4  It  does  not  appear, 
however,  that  he  supported  Ticknor  in  his  great  reformation. 
Some  years  later,  when  he  was  President  of  the  College,  "he 
threw  his  weight  against  the  system."  6 

1  Life  of  G.  Ticknor,  I.  354. 

2  Literary  Essays,  by  J.  R.  Lowell,  ed.  1890,  I.  83. 
8  Life  of  Ticknor,  I.  356. 

*  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  215. 
6  Annual  Reports,  1883-84,  p.  16. 


xii.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  217 

In  July,  1823,  nine  men,  of  whom  Judge  Story  was  one, 
met  at  Ticknor's  house  to  consider  what  steps  should  be  taken 
to  reform  Harvard.  The  faults  which  he  found  with  the  sys- 
tem he  stated  both  in  a  paper  which  he  laid  before  them,  and 
also  in  a  pamphlet  which  he  subsequently  published.  "  All 
our  Colleges,"  he  said,  "have  been  long  considered  merely 
places  for  obtaining  a  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts,  to  serve  as 
a  means  and  certificate  whereon  to  build  the  future  plans  and 
purposes  of  life."  No  change  had  been  made  in  the  old 
system  by  which  every  student  was  taught  by  every  tutor, 
receiving  exactly  the  same  instruction,  neither  more  nor  less, 
as  the  rest  of  his  classmates.  But  at  Harvard  "there  are 
now,"  he  continues,  "twenty  or  more  teachers  and  three 
hundred  students,  and  yet  the  division  into  Classes  remains 
exactly  the  same,  and  every  student  is  obliged  to  pass  through 
the  hands  of  nearly  or  quite  every  instructor.  The  recita- 
tions [the  lectures  of  an  Oxford  College]  become  mere  enu- 
merations. The  most  that  an  instructor  now  undertakes  is  to 
ascertain,  from  day  to  day,  whether  the  young  men  who  are 
assembled  in  his  presence  have  probably  studied  the  lesson  pre- 
scribed to  them.  .  .  .  We  are  neither  an  University — which 
we  call  ourselves  —  nor  a  respectable  High  School,  which  we 
ought  to  be.  ...  As  many  years  are  given  to  the  great 
work  of  education  here  as  are  given  in  Europe,  and  it  costs 
more  money  with  us  to  be  very  imperfectly  educated  than  it 
does  to  enjoy  the  great  advantages  of  some  of  the  best  univer- 
sities on  the  Continent.  And  yet  who  in  this  country,  by 
means  here  offered  him,  has  been  enabled  to  make  himself  a 
good  Greek  scholar?  Who  has  been  taught  thoroughly  to 
read,  write,  and  speak  Latin?  " l  Nearly  half  a  century  later, 

1  Life  of  G,  Ticknor,  I.  356-363. 


218  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

as  one  of  the  Trustees  of  the  Zoological  Museum  at  Harvard, 
Ticknor  had  to  address  a  Committee  of  the  Legislature  of 
Massachusetts.  Speaking  of  the  great  work  done  by  Professor 
Agassiz  in  the  University,  he  said  that  by  making  Natural 
Science  "move,"  he  had  made  languages,  history,  and  liter- 
ature follow.  "  Natural  Science  has  tended  to  open  Harvard 
College;  to  make  it  a  free  University,  accessible  to  all, 
whether  they  desire  to  receive  instruction  in  one  branch  or 
in  many."  1 

The  whole  work  of  the  College  was  not,  however,  confined 
to  "recitations"  at  the  time  when  Ticknor  was  trying  to 
introduce  his  reforms.  Professor  Peabody  writing  of  those 
days  says:  "The  recitations  were  mere  hearings  of  lessons, 
without  comment  or  collateral  illustrations.  The  leading 
feature  of  the  College  was  the  rich  provision  made  for 
courses  of  lectures.  It  may  be  doubted  whether  so  many 
lecturers  of  an  exceptionally  high  order  have  ever,  at  any  one 
time,  been  brought  together  in  the  service  of  an  American 
College.  By  far  the  largest  part  of  our  actual  instruction  was 
that  of  the  lecture-room,  where  it  was  our  custom  to  take 
copious  notes,  which  were  afterwards  written  out  in  full.  The 
amount  of  study  and  actual  attainment  was,  I  think,  much 
greater  with  the  best  scholars  of  each  class,  much  less  with 
those  of  a  lower  grade  than  now.  The  really  good  scholar 
gave  himself  wholly  to  his  work.  He  had  no  distractions,  no 
outside  society,  no  newspapers.  Consequently  there  remained 
for  him  nothing  but  hard  study;  and  there  were  some  in  every 
class  whose  hours  of  study  were  not  less  than  sixty  a  week."  2 
Ticknor,  it  must  be  remembered,  wrote  as  a  young  man,  with 

1  Life  of  G.  Ticknor,  II.  423. 

2  Reminiscences  of  Harvard  College,  p.  2O2. 


xii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  219 

his  mind  full  of  the  evils  which  thwarted  him  at  every  step; 
Professor  Peabody  as  an  aged  man,  complacently  surveying  a 
happy  and  a  studious  youth.  What  he  tells  us  of  the  study  of 
German  shows  how  limited  was  the  range  of  knowledge  in 
New  England.  It  was  in  the  year  1825  that  he  joined  the 
first  German  class  ever  formed  in  Harvard.  "  We  were  looked 
upon  with  very  much  the  amazement  with  which  a  class  in 
some  obscure  tribal  dialect  of  the  remote  Orient  would  be 
now  regarded.  There  were  no  German  books  in  the  book- 
stores. A  friend  gave  me  a  copy  of  Schiller's  Wallcnstein, 
which  I  read  as  soon  as  I  was  able  to  do  so,  and  then  passed 
it  from  hand  to  hand  among  those  who  could  obtain  nothing 
else  to  read."1 

In  many  respects  a  member  of  one  of  the  smaller  Oxford 
Colleges  forty  years  ago  was  quite  as  ill-provided  with  instruc- 
tion as  a  Harvard  undergraduate.  In  my  own  College,  for 
instance,  during  the  greater  part  of  my  residence,  there  were 
but  three  tutors,  among  whom  were  divided  all  the  depart- 
ments of  learning  that  were  taught.  The  Master,  it  is  true, 
every  Sunday  lectured  on  the  Epistles  of  St.  Paul.  Of  the 
three,  one  taught  mathematics,  and  mathematics  alone.  Happy 
was  the  youth  who  had  a  taste  for  that  science,  as  he  met  with 
all  the  encouragement  that  can  be  given  by  a  most  able  teacher. 
The  other  two  took  between  them  the  rest  of  the  sciences  that 
were  recognized  in  the  College  —  Latin,  Greek,  metaphysics, 
ethics,  logic,  ancient  history,  and  divinity.  One  of  them  was 
a  sound,  old-fashioned  scholar,  but  a  somewhat  ponderous 
teacher;  the  other  was  a  man  of  amiable  character,  but  of 
very  moderate  attainments.  In  later  years  he  one  day  mod- 
estly owned  to  me  that  he  had  never  cared  for  books.  For- 

1  Reminiscences  of  Harvard  College,  p.  117. 


220  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

tunately  for  us,  we  were  able  to  obtain  a  certain  amount  of 
instruction  outside  the  College.  The  end  was  at  length  com- 
ing to  that  long  and  shameful  succession  of  University  Pro- 
fessors who,  to  quote  Gibbon's  words,  "well  remembered  that 
they  had  a  salary  to  receive,  and  only  forgot  that  they  had  a 
duty  to  perform."  Some  still  survived  —  one  or  two  even 
now  are  extant  —  men  who,  if  they  did  anything,  did  noth- 
ing more  than  year  after  year  offer  to  read  aloud  the  same 
course  of  lectures.  An  ardent  and  ingenuous  youth  of  my 
time,  or  a  little  earlier,  attended  the  first  lecture  of  the  yearly 
course  of  the  Camden  Professor  of  Ancient  History,  and 
formed  the  whole  audience.  The  venerable  Professor  sat 
silent  in  his  chair  for  some  ten  minutes;  then  addressing  him, 
he  said :  "  Sir,  it  seems  that  you  alone  wish  to  hear  my  lect- 
ure. Perhaps  it  will  do  you  quite  as  much  good  if  you  take 
it  to  your  rooms  and  read  it  there  to  yourself;  but  if  you 
desire  it,  I  will,  as  I  am  bound  by  the  statutes  of  the  Univer- 
sity, deliver  it  orally."  The  youth  politely  assented  to  his 
suggestion.  He  read  it,  found  it  pleasingly  written,  returned 
it,  but  did  not  venture  to  form  the  audience  for  the  second 
lecture.  To  some  of  the  Chairs  younger  men  had  been  ap- 
pointed. Mansell  was  lecturing  on  Aristotle,  Jowett  on  Plato, 
and  Conington  on  Latin  composition.  Their  lectures  were 
open  to  the  undergraduates  of  every  college.  So  many  men 
attended  Conington's  lectures  on  Latin  prose  composition 
that  he  ceased  giving  them.  The  College  tutors,  he  said, 
were  throwing  their  work  on  him.  It  seems  incredible  that 
less  than  forty  years  ago  a  course  of  public  lectures  in  the 
University  of  Oxford  was  brought  to  a  close  because  it  was  so 
largely  attended.  Conington,  no  doubt,  was  indignant  at  being 
drawn  away  from  his  higher  work  as  a  scholar  by  the  drudgery 


xii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  221 

of  correcting  twice  a  week  some  hundred  exercises.  That  he 
should  be  provided  with  an  assistant  professor  did  not  seem 
to  have  occurred  to  anybody's  mind.  Natural  Science  was  at 
this  time  just  beginning  to  be  recognized  —  crouching  like  a 
second  Cinderella  among  the  scornful  sister  sciences.  In  my 
first  term  I  saw  the  foundation  stone  laid  of  the  New  Museum 
by  the  Chancellor,  the  Earl  of  Derby.  One  of  my  college 
friends  was  placed  in  the  first  class  in  the  first  examination 
ever  held  in  Natural  Science.  His  high  position  had  cost  him 
but  a  few  months'  study.  I  remember  his  telling  us  one  even- 
ing at  dinner  how  that  day  in  the  Schools1  he  had  gone  up 
to  an  examiner  and  pointed  out  an  error  in  the  paper  of 
questions.  The  poor  man  nervously  maintained  that  he  was 
right,  and  offered  to  show  his  authority.  He  produced  some 
learned  work ;  but,  as  my  friend  convinced  him,  he  had  alto- 
gether misread  it.  Oxford,  in  many  of  the  great  branches  of 
learning,  and  in  some  respects  in  all,  was  indeed  far  distant  in 
those  days  from  that  "  real  university  "  of  which  Ticknor  had  a 
vision.  There  is  still  not  a  little  for  her  to  do  before  it  shall 
be  completely  realized,  but  in  the  last  forty  years,  much,  very 
much,  has  been  done.  How  much,  too,  has  been  done  in 
Harvard  ! 

It  was  in  the  spring  of  1821  that  Ticknor,  by  an  appeal  to 
the  President,  made  his  first  attempt  to  transform  the  College. 
By  June,  1825,  though  he  had  failed  to  convince  either  him  or  a 
large  majority  of  the  Professors,  he  had  brought  over  the  Cor- 
poration and  the  Overseers  to  many  of  his  views.  They  were 
willing  to  do  as  much  as  perhaps  it  was  wise  to  attempt.  They 
divided  the  College  into  departments,  in  which  the  under- 
graduates were  to  be  classified  according  to  their  proficiency ; 

1  The  examination-rooms. 


222  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

they  allowed  a  limited  choice  of  studies,  and  they  admitted  to 
special  studies  students  who  had  no  intention  of  taking  a 
degree. l  The  reform  failed,  as  reforms  almost  always  do  fail 
when  they  are  under  the  management  of  those  who  do  not 
wish  well  to  their  success.  There  are  few  bodies  of  men  who 
cling  more  to  old  ways  and  old  customs  than  teachers,  unless 
perchance  it  be  their  pupils.  The  undergraduates  —  at  all 
events  the  dull  and  indolent  majority  —  raised  the  standard  of 
revolt.  They,  it  seemed,  liked  the  good  old  system  by  which 
quick  and  slow,  well-taught  and  ill-taught,  jogged  along  at  the 
same  even  pace.  Their  acts  of  disorder  were  so  frequent 
that  in  less  than  two  years  the  old  system  was  resumed  to 
nearly  its  full  extent,  everywhere  but  in  the  Department  of 
Modern  Languages.  There  Ticknor,  working  his  own  scheme, 
met  with  great  success.  He  describes  how  in  January,  1826, 
fifty-five  Freshmen  entered  for  French,  of  whom  forty-eight 
were  wholly  ignorant  of  the  language.  The  seven  who  knew 
something  of  it  he  put  into  an  advanced  class  by  themselves ; 
the  rest  he  broke  up  into  five  alphabetical  divisions.  In 
March  he  rearranged  them  all  according  to  their  proficiency. 
By  the  end  of  the  year  "  there  were  more  than  five  hundred 
pages  between  the  highest  and  the  lowest  divisions,  besides  a 
great  difference  in  grammatical  progress."  Of  the  seven  who 
had  the  lead  on  entering,  not  a  single  one  kept  it.  The  system 
succeeded,  he  maintained,  because  "  the  law  was  administered 
according  to  its  spirit  and  intent,  by  officers  who  approved  it, 
and  it  was,  from  this  administration  of  it,  felt  by  the  students  to 
be  useful,  just,  and  beneficial." 2  Perhaps,  after  all,  the  acts  of 
disorder  in  the  other  departments  were  due  more  to  the  preju- 
dices of  the  Professors  than  to  the  obstinacy  of  the  pupils. 
1  Life  of  G.  Ticknor,  I.  362.  2  /£.  j.  ^ 


xii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  223 

Ticknor's  biographer  tells  us  that  "  he  often  dwelt  with  satis- 
faction on  the  fact  that,  in  the  fifteen  years  during  which  he 
was  Professor,  he  was  never  obliged  to  apply  to  the  College 
Faculty  on  account  of  any  misdemeanour  in  the  recitation- 
rooms  under  his  charge,  or  in  his  lecture-room ;  nor  did  he 
ever  send  up  the  name  of  any  young  man  for  reproof."  The 
constant  opposition  which  he  encountered,  whenever  he  tried 
to  realize  his  vision  of  a  great  university,  at  last  wore  out  his 
patience.  "As  long  as  I  hoped  to  advance  these  changes," 
he  wrote,  "  I  continued  attached  to  the  College ;  when  I  gave 
up  all  hope  I  determined  to  resign."  1 

Harvard  was  impeded  in  its  progress,  not  only  by  that 
inherited  narrowness  which  is  common  to  so  many  universities, 
but  also  by  an  excessive  provincialism  unknown  in  England 
and  Germany.  Between  Oxford  and  Glasgow  a  close  connec- 
tion has  existed  for  nearly  two  centuries.  Adam  Smith  spent 
six  or  seven  years  of  his  youth  at  Balliol  College.  When 
Motley  followed  his  countrymen  to  Gottingen,  the  Hanoverian 
University,  he  had  for  his  fellow-student  that  Prussian  of  Prus- 
sians, Bismarck.  But  Harvard,  so  far  from  being  the  University 
of  the  United  States,  was  not  even  the  University  of  New  Eng- 
land, and  scarcely  of  Massachusetts.  In  1831,  B.  R.  Curtis, 
writing  to  Ticknor  from  Northfield,  in  the  northwest  of  that 
State,  about  the  causes  of  dissatisfaction  with  Harvard  in  that 
part  of  the  country,  mentions  as  "  the  last,  but  far  from  least 
cause,  that  it  is  the  College  of  Boston  and  Salem,  and  not  of 
the  Commonwealth."2  Thirteen  years  later,  in  1844,  Mr.  D. 
A.  White,  in  an  address  to  the  Alumni,  maintained  that  "  Har- 
vard is  fast  becoming  simply  a  High  School  for  a  portion  of 

1  Life  of  G.  Ticknor ;  I.  368,  400. 

2  Life  of  B.  R.  Curtis,  I.  50. 


224  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

our  youth  of  Boston  and  its  vicinity."  l  Even  at  the  present 
time,  with  all  the  width  of  its  studies  and  the  liberality  of  its 
government,  it  has  scarcely  succeeded  in  becoming  the  great 
National  University.  A  writer  in  the  Harvard  Graduates' 
Magazine  for  January,  1893, 2  says:  "The  frequent  remark  is 
true,  that  Harvard  is  a  Massachusetts  and  New  England  Col- 
lege. Although  the  whole  number  of  Harvard  men  [he  is 
speaking  of  graduates]  is  greater  by  800  than  the  whole  num- 
ber of  Yale  men,  yet  in  the  Middle  States  Harvard  has  only 
1303  and  Yale  1986.  In  the  State  of  New  York  Harvard  has 
976  graduates  and  Yale  1417.  In  sixteen  Western  States 
Harvard  has  669  graduates  and  Yale  915."  It  was  mainly 
Harvard's  Unitarianism  which  made  the  outlying  States 
unfriendly  towards  her.  "  The  West  is  Orthodox.  The  States 
of  the  West  are  filled  with  Congregational,  Presbyterian,  Bap- 
tist, Methodist,  and  Episcopal  Churches.  To  certain  Western 
men  the  word  Unitarian  means  something  almost  as  harrow- 
ing as  the  word  Indian  meant  to  their  children  of  forty  years 
ago.  Harvard  is  no  longer  a  Unitarian  College,  but  the  repu- 
tation of  Harvard  as  a  Unitarian  College  still  lingers." 3  Even 
the  attempt  to  free  it  from  religious  domination  of  any  kind 
gave  a  shock.  In  1846,  B.  R.  Curtis,  who  had  been  a  Judge 
in  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States,  and  who  was  a 
member  of  the  Corporation,  wrote :  "  I  am  pained  to  learn, 
even  imperfectly  as  yet,  how  lax  Mr.  Quincy's  administration 
has  been  of  late  years,  and  how  lazy  many  of  the  Faculty  have 
become.  What  do  you  think  of  a  New  England  College  where 
most  of  the  teachers  do  not  go  to  church  at  all,  and  next  to 
none  go  in  the  afternoon  ?  "  4  This  laziness  was  not  due  to  Presi- 

1  History  of  Higher  Education  in  Massachusetts,  p.  82. 

2  Ib.  p.  194.  8  Ib.  p.  200.  *  Life  of  B.  R.  Curtis,  I.  HO. 


Xii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  225 

dent  Quincy's  example,  for  "  during  the  sixteen  years  of  his 
administration  he  was  absent  from  prayers  twice  only,  and  then 
he  was  detained  in  Court  as  a  witness."  1  It  was,  as  I  have 
shown,  in  the  hope  of  overcoming  all  prejudices  connected 
with  religion,  that  nearly  forty  years  ago  the  attempt  was  made 
to  lop  off  the  Divinity  School  from  the  University.  It  is,  no 
doubt,  the  same  hope  that  so  liberally  opens  the  College 
Chapel  and  the  Lecture  Room  to  divines  of  every  denomina- 
tion, and  that  last  Commencement  conferred  the  honorary 
degree  of  Doctor  of  Divinity  on  the  Bishop-elect  of  Massa- 
chusetts and  of  Doctor  of  Laws  on  a  Bishop  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church.  The  prejudice  happily  seems  to  be  weak- 
ening. In  1886  only  sixteen  in  every  hundred  students  came 
from  the  West  and  South;  by  1892  the  proportion  of  sixteen 
had  risen  to  over  nineteen.  Nevertheless,  "  Massachusetts 
alone  furnishes  considerably  more  than  half  the  total  num- 
ber." 2 

By  the  foundation  of  the  School  of  Medicine  in  1783,  of 
the  School  of  Law  in  1817,  and  of  the  School  of  Theology  in 
1819,  much  had  been  done  towards  preparing  the  way  for  a 
real  University.  "  In  the  establishment  of  our  Schools  of  The- 
ology, Law,  and  Medicine,"  writes  Professor  Goodwin,3  "which 
largely  follow  German  precedents,  we  made  the  greatest  depart- 
ure from  our  English  antecedents."  It  was  not  so  much  in 
their  first  establishment  as  in  their  later  modifications  that 
"these  three  professional  Schools  have,"  to  use  his  words, 
"fairly  represented  three  of  the  Faculties  of  the  German 

1  An  Historical  Sketch,  etc.,  p.  45. 

2  Harvard  Graduates'  Magazine,  January,  1893,  P-  24&    There  are 
more  than  three  hundred  Catholic  students  in  the  University.     Ib.  June, 
1894,  p.  531. 

8  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  22. 
Q 


226  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  XH. 

University."  The  Faculty  of  Arts  and  Sciences  had,  moreover, 
been  greatly  widened  and  strengthened.  In  the  first  fifty  years 
of  the  present  century  more  than  twenty  professorships  in 
the  different  schools  were  established.  The  work  generally 
demanded  of  the  Professors,  new  and  old  alike,  was  excessive 
in  amount  and  far  too  mechanical  in  quality.  They  sat  behind 
a  schoolmaster's  desk  many  more  hours  every  week  than  they 
filled  a  Professor's  chair.  While  in  term  time  their  whole 
strength  was  used  up,  not  so  much  in  lecturing  as  in  hearing 
lessons,  their  vacations  were  not  long  enough  to  allow  of  much 
scholarly  work.  Longfellow,  soon  after  his  appointment,  began 
to  complain  bitterly  of  his  position,  as  the  following  entries  in 
his  Journal  show:  "March  6,  1839.  I  am  weary  and  sick 
to-night.  College  duties  called  me  from  my  bed  before  day- 
light. I  hate  such  over- early  rising.  The  apparition  of  a  tall 
negro  with  a  lanthorn  in  my  bedroom  at  such  a  holy  hour  dis- 
turbs the  morning  vision.  Breakfast  at  six  is  intolerable." 
"March  18,  1839.  I  have  three  lectures  a  week  and  recita- 
tions without  number.  Three  days  in  the  week  I  go  into  my 
class-room  between  seven  and  eight,  and  come  out  between 
three  and  four  —  with  one  hour's  intermission."  "September 
21,  1839.  My  work  here  grows  quite  intolerable,  and  unless 
they  make  some  change  I  will  leave  them  —  with  or  without 
anything  to  do.  I  will  not  consent  to  have  my  life  crushed  out 
of  me  so." l  He  asked  for  an  assistant  in  the  French  courses. 
The  Corporation  in  reply  voted  :  "  The  Smith  Professor  ought 
to  continue  to  give  all  instruction  required  in  the  French 
language."  He  refused  to  submit,  and  in  the  end  was  allowed 
"  a  French  instructor."  2 

1  Life  ofH.  W.  Longfellow,   I.  315,  316,  332. 

2  ft.  pp.  330,  336. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

The  Elective  System.  —  American  Schools.  —The  Study  of  Greek  at  Oxford 
and  Cambridge.  — Examinations  and  Prizes.  —  The  Graduate  School. 

THOUGH  Ticknor's  great  scheme  of  reformation  failed 
for  the  time,  yet  the  seeds  were  sown.  Retrograde  Presi- 
dents might  be  appointed  such  as  Jared  Sparks,  of  whom  Long- 
fellow recorded  in  his  Journal :  "June  20,  1849.  Mr.  Sparks's 
inauguration.  His  Address  very  substantial,  but  retrograde. 
He  spoke  of  the  College  only,  and  not  of  the  University." l 
Nevertheless,  as  time  went  on,  and  the  men  who  had  been  bred 
under  the  old  system  dropped  off  one  by  one,  their  successors, 
many  of  whom  had  studied  in  Germany,  revived  the  scheme 
and  slowly  but  steadily  carried  it  forward  into  every  depart- 
ment. Harvard  grew  more  and  more  unlike  its  mother  Uni- 
versity, showing,  to  use  Professor  Goodwin's  words,  that  its 
"  chief  reforms  in  teaching  and  in  organization  have  been  in- 
spired from  Gottingen  and  Berlin  rather  than  from  Cambridge 
and  Oxford."2  It  was  at  something  more  than  the  perfection 
of  Harvard  as  a  place  of  instruction  and  education  that  the 
young  reformers  aimed.  They  were  bent  on  making  it  a  great 
seat  of  learning,  where  not  only  men  should  be  taught  all  that 
is  already  known,  but  where  teachers  and  students  should  join 
in  advancing  the  boundaries  of  knowledge. 

It  was  not  till  the  year  1867  that  the  first  great  step  was  taken 

i  Life  offf.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  142. 
"2  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  22. 
227 


228  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

towards  this  noble  end.  "  It  was  in  that  year,"  writes  Professor 
Goodwin,  "  that  the  elective  system  of  studies  was  introduced. 
It  gave  a  great,  even  an  unexpected,  stimulus  to  freedom  of 
every  kind  both  in  teaching  and  in  studying.1  "  The  Faculty," 
to  quote  President  Eliot's  words,  "  set  out  upon  a  road  which 
they  have  steadily  followed  ever  since."  2  It  was  not  till  seven- 
teen years  later  that  the  victory  was  won  all  along  the  line. 

The  faults  of  the  old  system  are  nowhere  more  clearly  shown 
than  in  the  following  anecdote  told  of  Prescott's  College  days 
by  his  biographer,  George  Ticknor.  "  Mathematics  seemed  to 
constitute  an  insurmountable  obstacle.  He  became  desperate 
and  took  to  desperate  remedies.  He  committed  to  memory, 
with  perfect  exactness,  the  whole  mathematical  demonstration 
required  of  his  class,  so  as  to  be  able  to  recite  every  syllable 
and  letter  of  it  as  they  stood  in  the  book,  without  comprehend- 
ing the  demonstration  at  all,  or  attaching  any  meaning  to  the 
words  and  signs  of  which  it  was  composed."  At  length  "  he 
went  to  his  Professor  and  told  him  the  truth;  not  only  his 
ignorance  of  geometry,  and  his  belief  that  he  was  incapable  of 
understanding  a  word  of  it,  but  the  mode  by  which  he  had 
seemed  to  comply  with  the  requisitions  of  the  recitation- 
room,  while,  in  fact,  he  evaded  them ;  adding,  at  the  same 
time,  that  as  a  proof  of  mere  industry,  he  was  willing  to  persevere 
in  committing  the  lessons  to  memory."  The  Professor  was  a 
sensible  man.  "  He  merely  exacted  his  attendance  at  the 
regular  hours,  from  which,  in  fact,  he  had  no  power  to  excuse 
him  ;  but  gave  him  to  understand  that  he  should  not  be  troubled 
further  with  the  duty  of  reciting.  The  solemn  farce,  therefore, 
of  going  to  the  exercise,  book  in  hand,  for  several  months, 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  6. 

2  Annual  Reports,  1883-84,  p.  21. 


XIIL  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  229 

without  looking  at  the  lesson,  was  continued,  and  Prescott  was 
always  grateful  to  the  kindly  Professor  for  his  forbearance."  * 

Charles  Sumner  had  no  more  taste  for  the  study  than  his 
friend  Prescott.  "With  downright  frankness  he  said  one  day 
in  the  recitation-room  to  the  Professor  who  was  pursuing  him 
with  questions :  '  I  don't  know,  you  know  I  don't  pretend 
to  know,  anything  about  mathematics.'  Quickly,  but  good- 
humouredly,  the  Professor  replied,  getting  the  laugh  on 
the  pupil,  '  Sumner  !  Mathematics  !  mathematics  !  Don't  you 
know  the  difference?  This  is  not  mathematics.  This  is 
physics:  " 2 

One  of  the  most  eminent  mathematicians  at  Oxford  told  me, 
that  in  the  days  when  for  the  final  examination  for  the  Bach- 
elor of  Art's  degree  some  mathematics  were  required,  he  had 
before  him  an  undergraduate  who  professed  to  know  the  first 
six  books  of  Euclid.  Whatever  proposition  he  was  called  upon 
to  do,  he  at  once  without  a  moment's  hesitation  drew  the  fig- 
ure ;  then,  leaning  back  in  his  chair  and  fixing  his  eyes  on  the 
ceiling,  he  rapidly  and  without  error  went  through  the  whole 
demonstration.  He  had  done  all  that  was  required  of  him, 
and  he  took  his  degree ;  nevertheless,  it  was  as  clear  as  day 
that  he  was  as  ignorant  of  Euclid  as  he  had  been  the  day  before 
he  was  first  made  to  take  his  stand  on  this  huge  tread-mill. 
I  remember  how  one  of  the  friends  of  my  undergraduate  days 
—  a  man  who  has  since  made  a  mark  in  literature  —  tri- 
umphantly in  the  presence  of  two  or  three  of  us  committed 
his  copy  of  Colenso's  Arithmetic  to  the  flames  the  moment  he 
had  passed  his  examination. 

Emerson's  ideal  university  was  a  place  "where  attendance 
at  lectures  should  be  voluntary,  and  where  the  students'  conduct 

1  Life  of  W.  H.  Prescott,  ed.  1864,  p.  21.  2  Life  of  Sumner,  I.  47. 


230  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

should  be  in  the  hands  of  the  ordinary  city  police." l  As  re- 
gards the  attendance  at  lectures,  the  approach  that  has  already 
been  made  towards  his  ideal  would  perhaps  have  satisfied  the 
philosopher,  at  least  for  a  time.  Professor  Goodwin,  in  his 
Address  to  the  Phi  Beta  in  1891,  said  :  "  It  is  perfectly  possi- 
ble (though  I  sincerely  hope  it  is  not  probable)  that  some 
whom  we  welcome  here  to-day  for  the  first  time  have  never 
studied  a  word  of  Greek  or  Latin,  a  line  of  Mathematics,  or  a 
page  of  Philosophy,  Logic,  or  History,  during  their  under- 
graduate course.  And  yet  these  were  almost  the  only  studies 
by  which  a  student  could  gain  admission  to  our  Society  fifty 
years  ago." 2 

Before  they  entered  the  College  they  must  have  studied,  at 
all  events,  the  elements  of  some  of  these  subjects.  But  even  in 
the  examination  which  they  had  to  pass  for  admission 3  a  con- 
siderable freedom  of  choice  is  allowed.  Elementary  Greek, 
Latin,  French,  and  German  are  among  the  subjects  required  in 
the  ordinary  course ;  but  one  of  the  ancient  and  one  of  the 
modern  languages  may  be  omitted  by  those  who  pass  in  a 
certain  number  of  more  advanced  subjects.  For  instance,  for 
Greek  and  German  might  be  substituted  Physics  and  Chemistry, 
and  a  higher  knowledge  in  Latin,  French,  and  Mathematics. 
A  candidate  who  has  failed  in  some  of  the  subjects,  but  who 
has  distinguished  himself  in  others,  might  nevertheless  be  ad- 
mitted, on  the  condition  that  he  makes  up  his  deficiencies 
during  his  college  course.  Till  he  has  done  this  he  cannot 
advance  beyond  the  Sophomore  Class.4  The  candidate,  for 

1  Educational  Review  for  April,  1894,  p.  317. 

2  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  5. 

8  Matriculation  is  a  word  not  apparently  in  use  in  Harvard. 
4  Catalogue,  p.  189. 


Xiii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  231 

entrance  into  the  Medical  School,  must  pass  in  English,  Latin 
(the  translation  at  sight  of  simple  Latin  prose),  Physics,  Chem- 
istry, and  in  any  one  of  the  following  subjects  :  French,  Ger- 
man, Algebra  (through  quadratic  equations),  Plane  Geometry, 
Botany.  Those  who  have  taken  a  degree  in  any  recognized 
college  are  examined  only  in  Chemistry.1 

In  the  College  the  only  "  prescribed  studies  "  —  studies  in 
which  all  alike  must  share  —  are  for  Freshmen,  Rhetoric  and 
English  Composition  (three  times  a  week)  ;  Chemistry  (lect- 
ures, once  a  week  first  half-year)  ;  German  or  French  for 
those  who  do  not  present  both  for  admission  (three  times  a 
week)  ;  for  Sophomores  and  Juniors,  Themes  and  Forensics.2 
Seniors  (the  men  in  their  last  year)  are  left  unconstrained. 
With  all  this  freedom  of  choice,  from  every  student  in  every 
year  a  certain  amount  of  work  is  required.  The  studies  are 
divided  into  courses  and  half  courses,  according  to  the  estimated 
amount  of  work  in  each,  and  its  value  in  fulfilling  the  require- 
ments for  the  degree  of  A.B.  or  A.M."  In  each  of  his  four 
years  a  student  must  pass  through  four  of  these  elective  courses, 
receiving  instruction  three  hours  a  week  in  each.  Instead  of 
one  course  he  may  take  two  half-courses.3  Besides  his  "  pre- 
scribed studies,"  therefore,  he  attends  lectures  twelve  hours  a 
week  during  thirty-six  weeks  of  the  year  for  four  years  in- 
succession.4  He  is  not  left  free  to  rove  from  study  to  study 
among  the  three  hundred  and  thirty  courses  which,  in  their 

1  Catalogue,  p.  373. 

2  "  Twelve  themes.  —  Lectures  and  discussions  of  themes.  —  Forensics. 

—  Lectures  on  argumentative  composition.  —  A  brief  based  on  a  master- 
piece of  argumentative  composition.  —  Four  forensics  preceded  by  briefs. 

—  Discussions  of  briefs  and  of  forensics."     Ib.  p.  75. 
8  Catalogue,  pp.  64,  205. 

*  Some  part  of  the  time  each  year  is  occupied  in  examinations. 


232  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

tempting  varieties,  are  spread  before  him,  taking  a  sip  at  each, 
and  then  leaving  it  on  the  morrow  "  for  fresh  woods  and  past- 
ures new."  "The  elective  system,"  writes  President  Eliot, 
"  is  not  an  abandonment  of  system.  It  is  emphatically  a 
method  in  education,  which  has  a  moral  as  well  as  an  intel- 
lectual end,  and  is  consistent  with  a  just  authority,  while  it 
grants  a  just  liberty."  l  "  The  Freshman  Class  is  placed  under 
the  special  charge  of  a  Committee  of  the  Faculty,"  composed 
of  twenty-one  members,  "  each  member  of  which  acts  as  adviser 
to  a  certain  portion  of  the  class.  Every  Freshman  is  required 
to  submit  his  choice  of  studies  to  his  adviser  at  or  before  the 
beginning  of  the  year ;  and  his  work  is  to  be  carried  on  under 
the  supervision  of  that  officer."  Even  when  the  student  is  out 
of  his  Freshman  year,  "  his  choice  is  limited  to  those  studies 
which  his  previous  training  qualifies  him  to  pursue."  When 
once  his  choice  has  been  made  at  the  beginning  of  each  aca- 
demic year,  he  can  make  no  change  without  permission.2  In 
the  college  slang,  a  Freshman's  adviser  is  known  as  his  nurse. 

After  I  had  written  this  chapter  I  received  the  following 
letter  from  a  young  Bachelor  of  Arts,  who  took  his  degree  last 
summer  magna  cum  laudc.  He  says  :  — 

"  As  you  will  doubtless  have  heard  and  read  pretty  much  all  that  can 
be  said  in  favour  of  the  elective  system,  I  shall  try  to  show  you  a  little  bit 
of  the  other  side. 

"  A  considerable  number  of  men,  in  choosing  their  courses,  look  only  to 
the  convenience  of  the  hour  set  for  the  recitations  [lectures],  and  select 
a  course  because  it  chances  to  fall  in  with  their  arrangements,  without  any 
regard  to  its  subject.  Fellows  have  often  come  to  me  and  said :  '  Tell 
me  a  good  course  in  the  second  half  year,  I  do  not  want  a  nine  o'clock  or 
an  afternoon  lecture.'  This  naturally  does  not  apply  to  Freshmen,  whose 
choice  is  limited  and  directed  by  advisers. 

1  Annual  Reports,  1884-5,  P-  4-  a  Catalogue,  pp.  206-8. 


xiii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  233 

"  Again,  a  great  many  fellows  take  pains  to  look  for  courses  known  in  the 
College  slang  as  snaps  —  that  is,  easy  courses.  These  are  now  far  more 
difficult  to  find  than  they  were  even  when  I  came  to  College,  five  years  ago; 
for  it  very  soon  comes  to  the  ears  of  an  instructor,  that  his  course  has  the 
reputation  of  being  a  snap,  and  he  takes  steps  to  correct  the  impression. 

"  In  default  of  a  snap  an  easy-going  fellow  will  often  choose  a  very 
largely  attended  course,  knowing  that  convenient  arrangements  for  cram- 
ming can  be  made  before  examinations.  There  are  a  number  of  men  in 
Cambridge,  who  make  it  their  business  to  do  such  work,  either  by  private 
instruction,  or  at  rather  high  rates  —  generally  two  dollars  [eight  shillings 
and  two  pence]  an  hour  —  or  by  seminars,  that  is,  a  general  review  of  the 
course,  given  in  the  form  of  a  lecture  the  night  before  the  examination. 
I  have  repeatedly  seen  cases  of  men  receiving  a  respectable  mark,  after  no 
further  preparation  than  attendance  at  a  seminar.  At  these,  I  am  told, 
the  instruction  is  very  efficiently  given. 

"  There  are  a  certain  number  of  courses,  which  are  taken  by  a  rery 
large  majority  of  every  class  at  some  time  or  other.  Men  are  attracted  to 
them  by  the  personal  reputation  of  the  Professor,  and  by  a  sort  of  tradi- 
tion :  every  one  has  taken  them,  and  it  is  the  proper  thing  to  do.  Such 
courses  are  those  given  by  Professors  Norton  1  and  Shaler.2  The  exagger- 
ated attendance  at  these  courses  reacts  unfavourably  upon  them;  notably 
those  of  Professor  Norton,  where  the  class  is  so  large  that  no  suitable  room 
can  be  found  to  accommodate  it. 

"  On  the  other  hand,  there  are  certain  courses  which  are  taken,  I  sus- 
pect, largely  from  a  sense  of  duty.  The  best  examples  of  these  are  the 
courses  in  the  United  States  History  and  elementary  Political  Economy. 
These,  without  being  exceedingly  difficult,  are  by  no  means  snaps.  I  fancy 
that  they  are  largely  taken  by  the  advice  of  fellows'  fathers;  not  unfre- 
quently,  however,  because  a  man  wants  to  read  the  newspapers  intelli- 
gently and  the  like. 

"  A  great  danger  of  our  system,  even  to  industrious  fellows,  is  the  ten- 
dency to  early  specialization.  A  boy  comes  to  college  with  a  strong  dis- 
like for,  say  Mathematics,  and  is  not  likely  ever  to  take  any  courses  in  that 
department.  On  the  other  hand,  he  may  be  rather  good  at  the  Classics  and 
fond  of  general  reading,  and  so  he  drifts  into  Greek  and  Latin,  or  Litera- 
ture, and  finds  on  graduation  that  he  has  a  quantity  of  special  information 
in  one  line,  that  may,  or  may  not,  be  of  use  to  him,  and  is  wofully  de- 
fective in  general  information.  The  burden  of  the  lamentation  of  all  my 

1  Professor  of  the  History  of  Art.  2  Professor  of  Geology. 


234  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

classmates  during   their   Senior  year  was,  '  Oh,   that  I  had   my  college 
course  to  arrange  over  again !  ' 

"  In  spite  of  all  the  evil  I  have  said  of  the  elective  system,  it  still  appears 
to  me  to  be  infinitely  better  than  that  followed  in  our  other  universities." 

Professor  G.  H.  Palmer,  who  was  a  somewhat  late  convert 
to  the  merits  of  this  system,  who  in  advocating  it,  describes 
himself  as  "  that  desirable  persuader,  the  man  who  has  himself 
been  persuaded,"  put  the  following  question  "to  some  fifty  re- 
cent graduates :  '  In  the  light  of  your  present  experience,  how 
many  of  your  electives  would  you  change  ? '  I  seldom,"  he  con- 
tinues, "  find  a  man  who  would  not  change  some ;  still  more 
rarely  one  who  would  change  one-half.  As  I  look  back  on  my 
own  college  days,  spent  chiefly  on  prescribed  studies,  I  see  that 
to  make  these  serve  my  needs,  more  than  half  should  have  been 
different.  There  was  Anglo-Saxon,  for  example,  which  was  re- 
quired of  all,  no  English  literature  being  permitted.  A  course 
in  advanced  chemical  physics,  serviceable  no  doubt  to  some  of 
my  classmates,  came  upon  me  prematurely,  and  stirred  so  in- 
tense an  aversion  to  physical  study  that  subsequent  years  were 
troubled  to  overcome  it.  One  meagre  meal  of  philosophy  was 
perhaps  as  much  as  most  of  us  Seniors  could  digest,  but  I  went 
away  hungry  for  more.  .  .  .  Prescribed  studies  may  be  ill- 
judged  or  ill-adapted,  ill-timed  or  ill-taught,  but  none  the  less 
inexorably  they  fall  on  just  and  unjust.  The  wastes  of  choice 
chiefly  affect  the  shiftless  and  the  dull,  men  who  cannot  be 
harmed  much  by  being  wasted.  The  wastes  of  prescription 
ravage  the  energetic,  the  clear-sighted,  the  original  —  the  very 
classes  who  stand  in  greatest  need  of  protection."  l 

At  the  Commemoration  in  1886,  the  President  of  the  Alumni 
Association  indulged  in  a  boast  which,  well-founded  though  it 

1  The  New  Education,  by  G.  H.  Palmer,  pp.  14,  37. 


xiii.  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  235 

was,  has  of  late  years  been  a  source  of  mischief  to  the  cause 
of  education  in  America.  Self-complacency  is  none  the  less 
dangerous  when  it  is  found  in  a  whole  nation.  Speaking  of  the 
first  settlers,  he  said :  "  One  great  principle  they  contributed 
to  the  science  of  government,  and  the  greatest  of  states  and 
statesmen  might  well  be  proud  of  the  contribution.  That  the 
education  of  the  people  is  a  public  duty ;  that  there  is  a  right 
in  every  child  and  youth  in  the  land  to  its  rudiments,  and  to 
the  opportunity  for  a  larger  and  more  liberal  culture ;  that  the 
provision  for  this  is  a  legitimate  public  expenditure,  —  are 
principles  of  the  greatest  importance,  and  for  these  the  world 
is  indebted  to  them.  The  monuments  to  their  own  just  fame 
which  they  reared  by  the  establishment  of  this  College  and 
their  provision  for  public  schools  are  not  to  be  found  alone  in 
these  halls,  .  .  .  but  equally  in  the  humblest  village  schoolhouse 
wherever  in  the  broad  land  it  nestles  in  the  valley  or  by  the 
wayside."  1 

If  it  is  true  that  America  in  public  education  was  once  ahead 
of  all  the  nations,  that  lead  she  has  lost.  Cobden  and  Bright, 
were  they  living,  would  no  longer  point  to  her  as  an  example 
for  England  to  follow.  In  elementary  education,  in  which  we 
were  so  backward,  we  have  now  not  only  caught  her  up,  but 
outstripped  her.  In  the  secondary  schools,  moreover,  where 
university  students  receive  most  of  their  early  training,  she  lags 
still  farther  behind.  Instead  of  advancing,  as  we  have  greatly 
advanced  of  late,  she  has  not,  we  are  told,  even  maintained  her 
former  standard. 

"  It  is  a  notorious  and  discreditable  fact,"  writes  Professor 
Goodwin,  "  that  our  students  now  come  to  college  at  the  age 
of  nineteen  with  no  more  knowledge  than  an  English,  French, 

1  Harvard  College,  z^oth  Anniversary,  p.  251. 


236  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

German,  or  Swiss  boy  has  at  seventeen,  and  —  what  is  more 
discreditable  still  —  with  no  more  than  our  own  New  England 
boy  had  at  seventeen  fifty  or  sixty  years  ago.  One  of  the 
greatest  of  the  many  great  services  which  the  President  of  the 
University  has  rendered  to  the  cause  of  education  is  the  com- 
plete demonstration  which  he  has  given,  not  only  of  these  facts, 
but  also  of  their  causes.  .  .  .  The  real  waste  of  time  seems 
to  be  effected  chiefly  in  schools  of  the  lower  grades,  where  the 
skill  sometimes  shown  in  spreading  the  elements  of  learning 
thin  would  be  laughable  were  it  not  pathetic.  .  .  .  Boys  enter 
Exeter  Academy  now  older  than  they  once  left  it  for  college ; 
and  at  this  age  (sixteen  or  seventeen)  they  are  required  merely 
to  '  have  some  knowledge  of  Common  School  Arithmetic,  writ- 
ing, spelling,  and  the  elements  of  English  Grammar.'  I  select 
Exeter  as  an  example,  not  by  way  of  censure,  but  honoris  causa. 
We  are  sure  that  she  does  her  best  with  the  material  which 
comes  to  her  from  the  lower  schools.  And  this  is  the  best 
which  one  of  the  oldest  and  most  ambitious  New  England 
academies  can  now  demand  from  boys  of  sixteen  and  seven- 
teen, hardly  as  much  as  she  could  once  have  demanded  and 
obtained  from  boys  of  twelve  and  thirteen."1 

Two  years  ago  a  Committee  on  Secondary  School  Studies 
was  appointed  by  the  National  Education  Association.  The 
Chairman  was  President  Eliot.  The  Committee  nominated 
nine  "  Conferences,"  each  composed  of  men  of  great  experience 
in  the  subject  which  it  was  to  investigate.  In  the  nine  reports 
which  they  issued,  one  common  desire  was  found  running 
through  all :  "That  the  elements  of  their  several  subjects  should 
be  taught  earlier  than  they  now  are."2  The  Latin  Conference 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  pp.  36-39. 

2  Report  of  the  Committee  on  Secondary  School  Studies,  Washington, 
1893,  p.  14. 


xiii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  237 

reported :  "  In  the  United  States  the  average  age  at  which  the 
study  of  Latin  is  begun  is  about  fifteen  years,  and  probably 
above  the  number  rather  than  below  it.  In  England  and  on 
the  Continent  the  study  is  seldom  begun  so  late  as  at  the  age 
of  twelve,  and  much  oftener  between  the  ages  of  nine  and  eleven  ; 
in  other  words,  from  four  to  six  years  earlier  than  with  us." *  In 
a  footnote  on  this  passage  there  is  seen  the  curious  change 
which  has  come  over  the  words  Grammar  School  in  America. 
"  In  Michigan,"  we  read,  "  successful  experiments  have  been 
made  in  introducing  the  study  of  Latin  into  the  Grammar 
School ;  and  the  trial  is  also  being  made  in  certain  Grammar 
Schools  in  Massachusetts."  In  England,  Grammar  School 
almost  everywhere  retains  the  sense  in  which  Johnson  defines 
it :  "A  school  in  which  the  learned  languages  are  grammatically 
taught."  Such  a  school  no  doubt  once  was  "  The  Faire  Gram- 
mar School"  in  the  American  Cambridge,  now,  by  an  unhappy 
change,  known  as  the  Washington  School.  So  much  has  even 
the  tradition  of  the  older  education  passed  away,  that  "  in  a 
recent  Convention  of  Teachers,  not  far  from  Boston,  a  story  of 
some  English  schoolboys,  who  appeared  to  be  as  far  advanced 
in  their  studies  as  most  Sophomores  or  Juniors  in  New  England 
colleges,  was  received  with  many  expressions  of  astonishment 
and  with  some  of  incredulity."2 

Of  this  general  neglect  to  lay  the  foundations  of  the  higher 
learning  at  an  early  age,  there  are  doubtless  many  causes  of  which 
I  know  nothing.  I  have  been  told  that  many  an  American 
father,  whose  youth  had  been  one  hard  struggle,  is  bent  on 
letting  his  children  have  what  he  calls  "  a  good  time."  "  There 

1  Report  of  the  Committee  on  Secondary  School  Studies,  Washington, 

1893,  P-  6°- 

2  School  and  College,  February,  1892,  p.  99. 


238  HARVARD     COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

must,"  writes  Professor  Goodwin,  "be  a  thorough  awakening 
and  change  of  heart  on  the  part  of  indulgent  parents,  so  that 
they  shall  no  longer  consent  to  the  long  periods  of  idleness 
which  now  interrupt  their  children's  study,  or,  at  least,  shall  no 
longer  encourage  and  seek  to  extend  them." l  Schoolmasters 
seem  almost  as  weak  as  parents  are  indulgent.  "Another  evil, 
one  peculiar  to  this  country,  but  a  most  unnecessary  one,  is  the 
constant  interruption  of  study  by  calls  of  society,  and  by  a 
thousand  other  distractions  which  in  other  countries  would 
never  be  allowed  to  break  in  upon  study  in  school."  2  But 
who  can  look  for  strictness  in  schoolmasters,  who  hold  their 
office  by  an  uncertain  tenure,  and  who  might  be  cast  adrift  by 
the  votes  of  a  few  touchy  parents  ?  "  Some  of  the  conditions 
of  the  public  school  service  in  this  country,"  writes  President 
Eliot,  "  particularly  the  uncertain  tenure  of  office,  and  the  flue-,, 
tuating  quality  of  school  committees  or  boards,  are  unfortunately 
averse  to  the  creation  of  a  class  of  highly  educated  and  ex- 
perienced schoolmasters ;  but  custom,  if  not  statute,  makes 
some  public  school  offices  fairly  permanent,  the  endowed 
schools  of  the  country  already  offer  a  considerable  number  of 
desirable  posts,  and  the  large  cities  support  many  profitable 
private  schools  of  great  merit."  3  That  hateful  system  of  "the 
spoils  to  the  victors,"  has  been  allowed,  it  seems,  to  cast  its 
taint  even  on  the  education  of  children. 

The  money  which  is  laid  out  freely  on  schools  is  not  always 
laid  out  wisely.  "  The  same  profuse  liberality  which  spends  a 
quarter  or  a  half  million  of  dollars  on  a  schoolhouse  would  be 
equally  ready  to  equip  the  school  within  on  a  corresponding 

1  School  and  College,  February,  1892,  p.  104. 

2  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  37. 
8  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  16. 


XIII.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  239 

scale,  if  it  only  knew  how  this  could  be  wisely  done."  1  Bad 
systems  of  teaching,  moreover,  "  which  are  imposed  on  the 
teachers  by  standing  rules,  and  often  compel  a  good  teacher  to 
waste  nearly  as  much  time  as  a  poor  one,"  are  answerable  for  a 
great  part  of  the  general  backwardness.  The  quick  and  eager 
boy  is  sacrificed  to  the  dull  and  sluggish,  the  hard  worker  to  the 
idler.  "Classes  often  have  an  amount  of  work  given  them 
for  a  year  which  any  bright  boy  or  girl  can  do  in  three  months, 
while  there  is  no  regular  provision  by  which  those  who  can  do 
it  in  less  time  shall  as  a  matter  of  course  go  on  to  other  work." 2 
It  is  this  dead  level  at  which  the  pupils  are  kept,  added  to  the 
extraordinary  delay  in  setting  them  to  study  Greek  and  Latin, 
which  brings  the  most  promising  lads  to  the  University  so  far 
behind  our  highest  standard.  There  are  no  scholars  of  Balliol 
or  of  Trinity,  Cambridge,  to  be  found  among  them.  "It  is 
now  a  familiar  truth  to  most  of  us,"  writes  Professor  Goodwin, 
"  that  students  come  to  Harvard  College  at  nineteen,  in  most 
cases  badly  prepared  to  pass  an  examination  which  boys  of 
sixteen  or  seventeen  would  find  easy  work  in  England,  Germany, 
France,  or  Switzerland.  Most  of  these  young  men  have  spent 
the  preceding  three,  four,  or  five  years  in  doing  boys'  work, 
which  should  all  have  been  finished  before  they  were  sixteen. 
At  their  age  time  is  precious,  at  least  in  their  parents'  eyes,  and 
there  is  generally  a  struggle  to  finish  their  work  in  the  shortest 
possible  time.  The  preparatory  schools,  therefore,  devote  their 
chief  energies  to  '  fitting '  candidates  for  the  examination,  which 
the  College  mercifully  divides  between  two  years  to  temper  its 
severity.  It  is,  after  all,  a  mere  'pass'  examination,  which 
seldom  gives  any  opportunity  to  display  real  scholarship ;  and 

1  School  and  College,  February,  1892,  p.  100. 
*  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  37. 


240  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

yet  it  is  held  to  be  a  distinction  to  attain  three-quarters  of  the 
mark  in  any  subject ;  and  this  attainment  is  paraded  as  an 
'  honour,'  which  reflects  glory  on  the  pupil  and  on  the  school 
which  sent  him."  1  After  giving  an  account  of  the  classical 
authors  studied  in  the  higher  forms  at  our  Westminster  School, 
Professor  Goodwin  continues  :  "These  boys  need  very  little  of 
this  to  enter  either  Cambridge  or  Oxford,  where,  in  most  colleges, 
hardly  as  much  is  required  for  admission  as  at  Harvard  or  Yale ; 
but  they  know  that  those  who  bring  only  the  absolute  require- 
ments for  admission  are  practically  excluded  from  all  the  better 
instruction  at  both  Universities,  where  no  scholar  of  distinction 
gives  his  time  to  '  pass  men.'  "  How  little  the  highest  kind  of 
instruction  is  generally  given  in  the  American  High  Schools  is 
shown  by  the  fact  that,  "  although  Harvard  draws  rather  more 
than  one-third  of  her  students  from  States  outside  New  Eng- 
land, the  whole  number  of  students  who  have  come  to  her  from 
the  High  Schools  of  these  States  during  a  period  of  the  last 
ten  years  is  but  sixty-six.  Fitting  for  college  is  becoming  an 
alarmingly  technical  matter,  and  is  falling  largely  into  the  hands 
of  private  tutors  and  academies." 2 

It  is  not  the  duller  students  at  Harvard,  or  even  perhaps  the 
average  students,  who  are  below  the  standard  of  the  same  two 
classes  of  men  at  our  Universities.  Nothing  could  surpass  the 
grossness  of  the  ignorance  of  many  of  the  undergraduates  who 
come  from  our  most  famous  schools.  I  used  to  hear  one  of  the 
first  mathematicians  in  Oxford  piteously  lament  the  hard  fate 
which  condemned  him  to  try  to  put  a  little  arithmetic  into 
the  heads  of  young  men  whose  understandings  had  been  hope- 

1  Harvard  Graduate?  Magazine  t  January,  1893,  p.  190. 

2  The  New  Education,  by  G.  H.  Palmer,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in 
Harvard  University,  p.  75. 


XIII.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  241 

lessly  disordered  by  bad  teaching.  "  Why,  sir,  do  you  not  use 
your  common  sense?"  he  one  day  impatiently  asked  one  of 
his  pupils.  "  I  did  not  know  that  common  sense  had  anything 
to  do  with  arithmetic,"  was  the  reply.  We  are  not,  however, 
quite  so  bad  as  we  were.  We  have  made  some  advance  since 
the  day  —  forty  years  or  so  ago  —  when  a  promising  classical 
scholar,  fresh  from  Eton,  was  seen  by  his  tutor  adding  up  a 
column  in  which  he  had  entered  2s.  6d.  six  times  over.  He 
was  thus  laboriously  arriving  at  the  cost  of  half  a  dozen  pairs  of 
stockings  which  he  had  just  bought.  "  Why  do  you  not  do  it 
by  multiplying?  "  asked  the  tutor.  "  I  do  not  know  what  you 
mean,"  the  youth  modestly  answered.  When  he  was  shown  the 
process  and  had  had  explained  to  him  all  the  mystery  of  the 
multiplication  table,  he  was  so  much  taken  with  the  extraordi- 
nary facilities  which  it  afforded,  that  in  less  than  a  week  he  had 
it  by  heart. 

In  America,  it  is  clear,  a  better  classification  is  needed  both 
in  the  schools  and  in  the  Universities.  Democratic  equality  has 
been  allowed,  it  seems,  to  invade  even  the  province  of  the  mind. 
All  the  realm  of  learning  is  in  common.  It  is  felony,  not  to 
drink  small  beer,  but  to  ask  for  stronger  ale  than  most  heads 
can  stand.  In  the  school  there  should  be  that  sixth  form  which 
the  dull  and  backward  are  never  suffered  to  encumber ;  and  even 
in  this  sixth  form  there  should  be  no  absolute  equality  of  study. 
The  ablest  scholars,  while  they  did  all  that  was  done  by  the 
others,  should  have  a  wider  range  of  subjects.  In  the  University 
there  should  be  established  that  division  between  "  passmen  " 
and  "  classmen "  which  is  for  the  benefit  of  the  slow  and 
ignorant  almost  as  much  as  of  the  well-trained  scholar.  He 
must  no  longer  be  made  to  work  on  the  same  lines  as  the  dunce 
and  the  idler,  merely  doing  well  what  they  do  ill.  It  is  on  a 


242  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

higher  level  he  should  study,  and  at  a  greater  pace  that  he  should 
advance.  At  Harvard,  as  I  am  informed  by  one  of  the  most 
eminent  of  the  Professors,  "  it  is  perfectly  possible  for  the  best 
scholars  (in  rank)  to  earn  their  rank  and  their  scholarships  too 
in  courses  of  study  in  which  the  lowest  in  rank  can  pass  without 
censure.  This  is  intolerable  ;  and  yet  it  would  require  a  severe 
wrench  to  break  us  off  from  it.  Our  higher  courses,  it  is  true, 
give  students  an  opportunity  to  study  on  a  higher  level ;  but  we 
still  give  our  rank  and  our  scholarship  to  those  who  stand 
highest  in  the  general  competition ;  and  it  is  much  easier  to 
stand  high  in  a  lower  course  than  in  a  higher."  To  attain  the 
highest  success  the  student  has  to  reach  the  top  in  each  one  of 
the  sixteen  courses  through  which  he  has  passed  in  his  four 
years  at  College.  Whether  he  has  stood  on  the  summit  of 
sixteen  mole-hills  or  sixteen  mountains  matters  not  a  whit. 

d 

These  evils,  great  as  they  undoubtedly  are,  have  happily 
been  lessened  by  the  elective  system.  Real  scholars  would  not 
sacrifice  rank  to  knowledge,  but  would  choose  the  higher  courses. 
Thus  by  a  natural  process  they  would  classify  themselves.  It  is 
in  the  Graduate  School,  however,  free  as  it  is  from  all  artificial 
rewards,  that  the  Professor  who  has  the  cause  of  learning  deeply 
at  heart  finds  his  greatest  comfort  and  hope.  In  it,  I  am  told, 
there  are  students  as  good  as  the  best  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge 
—  not  perhaps  so  ready  and  versatile,  for  they  have  not  passed 
through  a  long  and  often  harmful  course  of  systematic  training, 
but  nevertheless  nowise  inferior  to  them  in  knowledge  and  in 
a  love  of  learning. 

In  our  ancient  Universities,  though  of  late  years  far  greater 
freedom  has  been  given  than  of  old,  nevertheless,  the  battle  of 
"  elective  studies  "  —  to  use  the  American  term  —  is  still  going 
on.  At  Oxford  and  at  Cambridge  no  one  can  take  his  degree 


Xlii.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  243 

who  has  not  some  knowledge  of  Greek  and  Latin.  At  Oxford 
he  can  bid  farewell  to  the  classics  when  he  has  passed  his  first 
examination ; l  but  without  some  Greek  and  Latin,  enough  to 
be  a  worry,  but  scarcely  enough  to  be  an  advantage,  the  Uni- 
versity is  barred  even  to  the  most  ardent  learner.  It  is  but  a 
short  while  since,  at  Cambridge,  the  attempt  to  make  Greek  an 
optional  study  was  defeated  by  an  overwhelming  majority.  In 
neither  University  does  the  widest  knowledge  in  one  depart- 
ment make  up  for  total  ignorance  in  another.  A  student 
might  write  as  good  Latin  as  Erasmus  ever  wrote,  and  might 
in  Mathematics  give  the  promise  of  a  second  Newton,  or  in 
Natural  Science  of  a  second  Darwin,  —  unless  he  knows  his 
Greek  irregular  verbs,  Oxford  and  Cambridge  will  have  none  of 
him.  Many  years  ago  I  had  a  pupil  who  was  painfully  carried 
on  in  Latin  to  the  edge  of  the  subjunctive  mood.  Over  it  he 
could  never  advance  one  step  without  coming  to  the  ground. 
To  attempt  to  force  him  to  learn  Greek  would  have  been  an 
act  of  wanton  cruelty.  At  the  end  of  one  summer  holidays 
his  mother  wrote  to  tell  me  that  she  had  met  the  Honourable 

Mr.  W ,  who  was  astonished  at  finding  that  her  son  did  not 

learn  Greek.  "Every  English  gentleman,"  he  said,  "learnt 
Greek."  She  wished,  therefore,  that  her  son  should  at  once 
begin.  Most  unwillingly  I  set  the  poor  dullard  to  work  at  the 
grammar.  When  he  had  struggled  on  as  far  as  the  end  of  the 
nouns,  I  told  him  that  he  need  go  no  further ;  for  that  now, 
quite  as  much  as  a  great  many  of  these  English  gentlemen,  he 
could  say  that  he  had  learnt  Greek.  His  mother  was,  I 
believe,  satisfied.  At  all  events,  I  heard  no  more  of  the 

Honourable  Mr.  W .     It  is  much  to  be  wished  that  our 

universities,  if  they  cannot  make  up  their  minds  to  altogether 

1  Responsions,  once  vulgarly  known  as  the  little  go,  but  now  as  smalls. 


244  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

abandoning  compulsory  Greek,  should  get  over  the  difficulty 
by  some  ingenious  fiction.  They  might,  for  instance,  decree, 
that  in  the  case  of  a  student  who  shows  unusual  proficiency  in 
any  great  branch  of  learning,  it  shall  be  taken  for  granted  that 
he  does  know  Greek,  and  that  the  examiners  shall  no  more  pre- 
sume to  test  his  knowledge  of  that  language  than  Don  Quixote 
presumed  to  test  the  strength  of  his  patched-up  helmet. 

The  advantage  of  this  system  of  elective  studies,  not  only  in 
other  branches  of  learning,  but  even  in  Greek,  is  set  forth 
by  a  man  whose  name  on  such  a  point  carries  great  weight  on 
both  sides  of  the  Atlantic.  The  Professor  of  Greek  Literature 
in  Harvard  University,  Dr.  Goodwin,  the  man  who,  of  all 
others,  should  have  mourned  over  the  change,  is  loud  in  its 
praise.  It  was  in  1856  that  he  began  to  teach  at  Harvard. 
"  In  that  year,  when  Greek  and  Latin  were  both  required  until 
the  end  of  the  Junior  [third]  year,  all  the  work  in  them  wal 
done  by  five  teachers.  Now  [in  1891],  when  both  are  entirely 
elective  from  the  beginning,  eleven  or  twelve  teachers  are 
fully  employed.  It  need  hardly  be  said  that  the  standard  of 
scholarship  in  every  department  was  at  once  raised  by  this 
reform.  It  sprang  up  of  itself  the  moment  the  old  pressure 
was  taken  off.  ...  I  cannot  emphasize  too  strongly  that  the 
chief  merit  of  the  present  elective  system  is  not  that  it  lets 
students  study  what  they  like  and  avoid  what  they  dislike,  but 
that  it  opens  to  all  a  higher  and  wider  range  of  study  in  every 
field ;  in  short,  it  has  made  really  high  scholarship  possible."  l 
President  Eliot,  speaking  of  the  system  generally,  says  that  "  it 
gives  every  teacher  the  precious  privilege  of  having  no  student 
in  his  class  who  has  not  freely  chosen  to  be  there."2  This 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  14. 

2  Annual  Reports,  1884-85,  p.  46. 


XIII.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  245 

privilege,  as  I  have  shown,  is  too  often  abused  by  the  idlers 
and  the  indolent,  who  at  Harvard,  just  as  it  happens  at  Oxford, 
as  far  as  they  can,  follow  those  studies  in  which,  with  the  least 
trouble  to  themselves,  they  can  take  their  degree.  In  Harvard 
the  degree  is  not  won,  as  in  the  English  Universities,  by  suc- 
cess in  three  or  four  public  examinations,  conducted  by  Boards 
of  Examiners,  but  by  the  student  satisfying  his  instructor  in  each 
one  of  the  eighteen  courses  through  which  he  passes  in  his 
four  years. l  The  instructor,  I  was  told,  does  not  altogether  go 
by  the  answers  in  the  examinations  which  he  himself  com- 
monly holds,  but  he  takes  into  consideration  the  difficulties 
which  may  have  arisen  through  such  circumstances  as  illness  or 
the  death  of  a  near  relative.  He  considers,  moreover,  a  stu- 
dent's habits  —  whether  of  idleness  or  industry.  One  of  the 
Professors  whom  I  consulted  thought  the  standard  too  low; 
another  said  that  the  system  works  well  if  each  Professor 
examines  his  own  class.  He  alone,  who  had  taught  them,  was 
competent  to  test  the  student's  knowledge  of  what  they  had 
been  taught.  At  the  end  of  each  course  "  the  standing  of  each 
student  is  expressed,  according  to  his  proficiency,  by  one  of 
five  grades."  He  who,  at  the  close  of  his  career,  is  found  to 
have  attained  the  highest  grade  in  fifteen  courses,  takes  his 
degree  summa  cum  laude.  The  highest  grade  in  nine  courses, 
or  the  highest  or  second  in  fifteen,  confers  a  magna  cum 
laude ;  and  the  highest  or  second  in  nine  courses  confers  a 
cum  laude.  The  summa  cum  laude,  moreover,  is  conferred 
on  any  one  who,  in  a  special  examination,  conducted  by  a  com- 
mittee of  the  Faculty,  near  the  close  of  the  Senior  year,  has 
shown  great  proficiency  in  any  department. 2 

Such  a  system  of  examinations  as  I  have  described  does  not 

1  Catalogue,  p.  209.  2  Ib.  pp.  210-215. 


246  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

put  the  students  through  that  severe  course  through  which  the 
highest  students  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge  pass  —  a  course 
which,  so  long  as  it  has  not  strained  the  mind  or  weakened  the 
body,  admirably  fits  a  man  for  the  severest  toil  of  professional 
life.  He  who,  with  health  unimpaired,  is  placed  at  Oxford  in 
the  First  Class  in  the  School  of  Literae  Humaniores,  or  at 
Cambridge  high  among  the  Wranglers,  is  not  very  likely  in 
after  life  to  be  daunted  or  baffled  by  any  kind  of  work,  how- 
ever hard  or  dry  it  may  be.  It  does  to  perfection  that  which 
it  was  meant  to  do.  It  fits  men  for  the  great  world  —  for  suc- 
cess at  the  Bar  and  in  public  life.  It  turns  out  great  lawyers 
and  great  statesmen.  It  keeps  up  a  constant  supply  of  lead- 
ing-article writers  —  men  who  can  rapidly  make  themselves 
masters  of  facts  and  as  rapidly  set  them  forth  in  a  clear  and 
able  form.  It  confers  infinite  dexterity  and  readiness.  On^ 
the  other  hand,  it  breaks  down  a  certain  number  —  perhaps 
not  many  —  by  the  excessive  strain  it  puts  upon  them,  and  it 
unfits  still  more  for  the  scholar's  life.  It  is  for  success,  not 
for  knowledge,  that  the  struggle  has  been,  and  it  is  success 
and  not  knowledge  that  far  too  often  is  its  great  reward.  "  Do 
not  spoil  your  careers,"  the  late  Master  of  Balliol  used  to  say 
to  his  undergraduates.  He  was  the  last  man  to  have  agreed 
with  Mr.  Lowell's  notion  of  a  University,  that  it  is  "  a  place 
where  nothing  useful  is  taught." l  I  have  heard  of  a  humorous 
saying  of  the  Master's  that  "  Diogenes  Laertius  was  a  learned 
man  in  the  worst  sense  of  the  word."  There  are  learned  men 
even  worse  than  Diogenes  Laertius  —  men  gifted  with  great 
powers,  who,  having  by  their  learning  won  a  high  reputation, 
then  turn  traders,  and  instead  of  increasing  knowledge,  traffic 
in  it.  The  Oxford  and  Cambridge  scholars  are  far  less  likely 

1  Harvard  College,  2^oth  Anniversary,  p.  216. 


OF  THF 

UNIVERSITY 

or 


xm.  HARVARD   COLZ&l  IfOR  247 


than  the  scholars  of  a  German  University  to  spoil  their  careers 
by  giving  themselves  up  to  the  noble,  but  ill-requited  life  of  a 
man  of  learning.  It  is  not  in  the  Schools  of  either  of  our 
great  Universities  that  is  awakened  that  ardent  spirit  of  research, 
that  love  of  knowledge  for  its  own  sake,  which  is  the  glory  of 
Germany.  Joint's  coronat  opus.  The  First  Class,  or  the 
Wranglership,  is  achieved,  and  the  goal  is  won.  In  a  way  as 
strange  as  it  is  absurd,  these  high  distinctions  sometimes  chill 
aspirations.  I  have  heard  a  great  Greek  scholar  at  Oxford 
pleasantly  describe  how  a  First  Class  man  often  becomes  afraid 
of  his  own  reputation  —  the  reputation  which  he  gained  before 
his  moustache  was  fully  grown.  Throughout  life  he  will  not 
give  to  the  world  any  piece  of  learned  work,  lest  it  should  not 
be  found  up  to  the  high-water  mark  of  his  two  and  twentieth 
year.  In  Harvard  there  is  none  of  this  blaze  of  glory  that 
comes  at  the  end  of  a  strain  prolonged  through  many  years. 
It  is  no  training-place  for  mental  athletes.  But  while  some- 
thing thereby  is  lost,  much  is  gained.  There  are  no  false 
suns  to  dazzle  the  scholar's  eyes.  It  is  not  the  goal  of  a 
four  years'  course,  with  its  shining  pillars,  that  lies  before 
him,  but  the  boundless  horizon  of  the  great  ocean  of  truth 
all  undiscovered. 

The  Fellowships  which  the  University  offers  to  graduates  are 
not  prizes  for  what  they  have  already  learnt,  but  means  of  sup- 
port while  they  learn  more.  No  young  Bachelor  of  Arts  is 
splendidly  rewarded  for  his  success  in  examinations  by  an 
annual  allowance  of  two  hundred  pounds  for  the  next  seven 
years.  There  is  no  Derby  Scholarship  that  adds  one  hundred 
and  fifty-seven  pounds  to  the  youth  who,  in  all  probability, 
has  already  won  more  money  prizes  than  any  man  of  his  stand- 
ing. There  is  no  Tom  Tiddler's  ground  where  the  "  brilliant  " 


248  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

men l  pick  up  gold  and  silver.  All  the  money  that  is  given,  is 
given  not  to  reward  students,  but  to  support  them  in  further 
studies.  They  either  go  to  work  in  some  foreign  university,  or 
far  more  commonly,  they  stay  on  to  work  in  the  Graduate  School 
—  that  School  in  which  Ticknor's  vision  of  the  real  university 
is  fast  taking  a  substantial  and  a  noble  form.  It  was  founded 
in  1872;  but  "for  many  years  its  development  was  retarded 
by  illiberal  and  artificial  rules  of  admission.  ...  In  the 
meanwhile  other  universities,  unhampered  by  inconvenient  tra- 
ditions, working  on  freer  lines,  and  amply  provided  with  fel- 
lowships of  considerable  value,  with  free  tuition  added,  in 
many  cases,  to  their  stipend,  outstripped  us  in  the  path  we  were 
entering."2  "The  enthusiasm,"  writes  Professor  Goodwin, 
"  with  which  our  best  Universities  are  now  organizing  studies 
for  Bachelors  of  Arts,  and  the  increasing  resort  of  graduates  to 
these  centres  of  learning,  show  the  power  of  this  movement 
towards  true  university  education,  a  power  which  is  just  begin- 
ning to  be  felt.  We  owe  special  gratitude  to  the  Johns  Hop- 
kins University  at  Baltimore,  which  called  public  attention  to 
the  importance  of  this  movement  by  its  bold  experiment  of 
establishing  its  Graduate  School  before  any  other  department 
was  organized,  and  by  devoting  its  chief  energies  to  this  from 
the  beginning.  In  these  new  Graduate  Schools  we  see  the 
brightest  hope  for  the  future  American  University."  3 

It  is  in  this  school  that  the  best  of  the  students  not  only 

1  At  Oxford,  and  perhaps  also  at  Cambridge,  a  "  brilliant "  man  is  an 
undergraduate  who  does  "  brilliant "  work  and  writes  "  brilliant "  essays. 
It  not  unfrequently  seems  that  brilliant  must  have  much  the  same  deriva- 
tion as  lucus  —  a  non  lucendo. 

2  From  a  Circular  of  Ten  of  the  Members  of  the  Administrative  Board 
of  the  Graduate  School,  dated  November  20,  1893. 

8  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  1 6. 


xni.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  249 

gather  knowledge  but  help  to  increase  it.  Here  it  is  that  is 
done  "  that  work  which  is  the  highest  duty  of  every  university, 
without  which  no  institution  has  ever  been  called  a  university  by 
men  who  weigh  their  words  with  full  intelligence,  —  the  work  of 
advancing  the  boundaries  of  knowledge  by  the  original  researches 
and  the  joint  labours  of  its  professors  and  its  students."1 
Graduates  of  other  Universities  are  flocking  to  it  from  all  sides  ; 
nay,  even  Professors,  who,  having  obtained  a  year's  leave  of 
absence,  descend  from  their  chairs  to  take  their  seats  once  more 
on  the  scholars'  bench.  Among  these  ardent  students  I  had  the 
pleasure  of  meeting  the  President  of  one  of  the  smaller  Western 
Universities.  Such  a  body  of  men  as  this  gives  a  higher  tone 
and  a  more  vigorous  life  to  the  whole  University.  It  inspirits 
the  work  of  the  Professors,  who  no  longer  have  to  travel  year 
after  year  the  same  round.  It  sets  a  higher  standard  before 
the  undergraduates,  who  have  in  their  midst  "  men  full  of  the 
spirit  of  independent  work,  and  of  a  sense  of  the  value  and 
meaning  of  learning."  It  opens  up  to  them  other  and  nobler 
fields  of  fame  than  the  baseball  and  football  grounds,  and  a 
greatness  immeasurably  above  the  greatness  of  the  mightiest 
of  athletes.  The  rapid  growth  of  this  school  shows  how  much 
it  was  needed  and  how  excellent  are  its  methods.  In  1886  it 
numbered  but  sixty-four  resident  students,  and  in  1889  ninety- 
six.  It  can  now  boast  of  two  hundred  and  forty-five.  Besides 
these  it  has  eleven  non-resident  Fellows,  of  whom  eight  are 
studying  in  Germany  and  two  in  France.  "  It  is  already  larger 
than  Harvard  College  was  fifty  years  ago." 2  One  thing  is  want- 
ing. It  has  none  of  that  social  life  which  not  only  throws  a 
charm  over  the  years  spent  in  a  great  University,  but  which 

1 A  Circular,  etc. 

2  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  pp.  28,  no  ;    Catalogue,  p.  287. 


250  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

teaches  a  lesson  which  cannot  be  got  out  of  books.  "The 
majority  of  the  students  in  the  Graduate  School,"  writes  an 
Instructor  in  Philosophy,  "  are  forlorn  atoms,  and  their  con- 
course is  too  fortuitous  ever  to  make  a  world.  A  man  who  has 
been  only  at  the  Graduate  School  is  not  a  Harvard  man."1 
This  statement,  I  am  told,  is  somewhat  overdrawn.  Groups 
are  formed  of  the  men  of  each  district  of  the  country.  The 
Californians,  for  instance,  would  hang  together,  and  so  would 
the  students  from  the  maritime  provinces.  The  day,  it  is  to  be 
hoped,  will  come  before  long  when,  in  some  noble  building, 
they  will  all  share  in  a  common  life. 

It  was  not  till  1886  that  admission  to  the  school  was  put  on  a 
sound  footing.  It  was  in  that  year  that  the  governing  bodies 
at  last  shook  themselves  free  from  the  conviction  that  none  must 
come  to  study  at  a  University  but  those  who  are  candidates  for 
a  degree  —  a  conviction  which  still  constrains  Oxford.  They 
rose  to  the  thought  that  at  a  University  it  is  knowledge  which 
should  be  sold  and  not  distinctions,  and  that  for  all  who  thirst 
for  it  the  gates  of  the  fountains  of  learning  should  be  opened 
wide.  Every  one  is  freely  admitted  who  can  show  that  he  has 
already  learnt  enough  to  be  able  to  follow  the  higher  studies. 
In  this  school  he  finds  "  perfect  freedom  both  in  teaching  and 
in  learning.  It  has  no  degree  in  course  for  which  all  students 
are  candidates,  and  consequently  no  paternal  supervision  of  each 
student's  daily  work." 2  Many  indeed  aim  at  the  higher  degrees 
of  Master  of  Arts  or  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy  or  Science,  for  no 
longer  are  the  higher  degrees  conferred  without  examination. 
Up  to  1872,  as  is  still  the  case  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  the 
Master's  degree  had  been  given  after  a  certain  lapse  of  time 

1  Educ ational  Review,  April,  1894,  p.  320. 

2  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  23. 


xni.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  251 

as  a  matter  of  course.  Now  it  is  only  awarded  after  a  further 
study  of  one  year  at  the  College  —  a  study  which  may  be  con- 
fined to  a  single  department.1  The  Doctor's  degree  is  given 
"  on  the  ground  of  long  study  and  high  attainment  in  a  special 
branch  of  learning,  manifested  not  only  by  examinations,  but  by 
a  thesis,  which  must  be  presented  and  accepted  before  the  can- 
didate is  admitted  to  examination,  and  must  show  an  original 
treatment  of  a  fitting  subject,  or  give  evidence  of  independent 
research."  2 

In  America  it  has  hitherto  been  more  difficult  even  than  in 
England  to  give  men  the  love  of  the  scholar's  life  —  the  life  of 
"  plain  living  and  high  thinking."  On  that  vast  continent  the 
great  and  rapid  conquests  of  man  over  wild  nature,  with  the 
splendid  rewards  that  followed  in  their  train,  tempt  almost  all 
the  ablest  men  away  from  the  world  of  thought  to  the  world  of 
action.  Even  some  of  the  lately-founded  universities  seem 
not  unlikely,  by  the  aid  of  their  noble  endowments,  to  bear 
their  part  in  corrupting  pure  learning.  In  their  eagerness  to 
secure,  perhaps  not  so  much  the  ablest  Professors  as  the  fame 
of  having  them,  they  offer  needlessly  high  salaries.  During 
the  academical  year  1891-92,  "seven  universities  and  colleges 
made  ineffectual  efforts  to  draw  teachers  of  Harvard  into  their 
service.  Four  Professors,  four  Assistant- Professors  and  six 
Instructors  declined  offers  of  higher  pay  and  higher  titles  at 
other  institutions."  Among  the  causes  "which  bind  its  teach- 
ers to  the  University,"  President  Eliot  reckons  "the  dignity 
and  stability  of  the  institution ;  the  perfect  liberty  of  opinion ; 
the  freedom  in  teaching  —  every  teacher  teaching  as  he  thinks 
best,  except  as  the  more  experienced  teachers  may  persuade 
and  inform  the  less  experienced ;  the  great  resources  of  the 

1  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  160;    Catalogue,  p.  297.  ~  Ib.  p.  299. 


252  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  xm. 

University  in  books  and  collections,  and  the  fact  that  any 
teacher  can  at  any  time  cause  books  desirable  in  his  depart- 
ment to  be  bought  by  the  Library;  the  separation  of  Cam- 
bridge from  the  luxurious  society  of  great  cities,  etc.,  .  .  . 
and  lastly,  the  consideration  which  learning  and  high  character 
traditionally  enjoy  in  Eastern  Massachusetts,  independent  of 
pecuniary  condition." 1 

1  Annual  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  8. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

The  Law  School.  —  Nathan  Dane.  —  Joseph  Story.  —  Professor  Langdell. 
—  The  Law  Library. — The  Law  Review. 

OF  her  Law  School  Harvard  can  be  prouder  even  than  of 
her  Graduate  School ;  for,  great  as  are  the  hopes  given 
by  one,  scarcely  less  great  are  the  performances  of  the  other. 
In  it  is  done  that  which  in  some  happier  day  in  our  own  coun- 
try will  be  done,  not  in  the  Solicitor's  office  and  in  the  Barris- 
ter's chambers,  but  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  It  is  here  that 
the  young  American  receives  his  legal  training.  No  lawyer  of 
any  standing,  I  was  told,  would  admit  into  his  office  a  pupil 
who  had  not  been  through  the  regular  course  of  a  University 
Law  School.  My  legal  friends  were  astonished  when  I  spoke 
of  the  fee  of  three  hundred  guineas  paid  in  England  to  a 
solicitor  by  his  articled  clerk,  and  of  one  hundred  guineas  paid 
to  a  barrister  by  his  pupil  for  leave  to  work  in  his  chambers 
for  a  year.  In  America,  so  far  from  there  being  a  fee  paid, 
there  is  often  from  the  first  a  salary  given,  however  small.  The 
Harvard  Law  School,  so  President  Eliot  reported  eight  years 
ago,  "  for  several  summers  past  has  been  unable  to  fill  all  the 
places  in  lawyers'  offices  which  have  been  offered  it  for  its 
third-year  students  just  graduating.  There  have  been  more 
places  offered,  with  salaries  sufficient  to  live  on,  than  there 
were  graduates  to  take  them."1  In  these  offices  there  is,  of 
course,  none  of  that  license  allowed  which  is  the  ruin  of  so 

1  Quoted  in  The  Green  Baglm  January,  1889,  p.  22. 
253 


254  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

many  of  our  students  of  law  at  home.  The  same  punctuality 
and  industry  are  required  of  the  young  lawyer  as  of  the  com- 
mon clerks.  Not  a  few  graduates  in  law,  on  taking  their 
degree,  at  once  begin  to  practise  on  their  own  account. 
Those,  however,  who  are  going  to  settle  outside  New  England 
and  New  York,  would  have  first  to  master  the  practice  and 
statute  law  of  the  State  in  which  they  intend  to  establish  them- 
selves. "  Honour  graduates  are  certain  to  receive  invitations 
to  enter  leading  law  offices  in  various  parts  of  the  country." l 
"The  citizens  of  the  United  States,"  writes  Professor  Dicey, 
"  are  certainly  neither  pedants,  nor,  in  general,  theorists ;  but 
at  the  present  moment  English  law  is  taught,  and  admirably 
taught,  in  the  colleges  of  America.  .  .  .  The  practising  counsel 
of  Massachusetts  would  undoubtedly  tell  you  that  the  best 
preparation  for  practice  in  court  is  study  in  the  lecture-rooms 
of  Professor  Langdell  and  his  colleagues  of  Harvard  Uni- 
versity." * 

The  Law  School  was  founded  in  1817,  but  down  to  1829  it 
was  little  more  than  a  shadow.  In  that  year  Nathan  Dane 
endowed  a  new  professorship  from  the  money  which  he  had 
made  by  his  "  once  famous  Abridgment  of  American  Law." 
Forty-two  years  earlier  he  had  drafted  that  beneficent  Ordi- 
nance by  which  the  whole  of  the  great  Northwest  was  kept 
free  from  the  taint  of  slavery.  In  his  old  age  he  not  only 
founded  the  professorship,  but  he  founded  it  on  the  condition 
that  Judge  Story  first  filled  the  chair.  Even  he,  full  of  hope 
though  he  was,  could  hardly  have  foreseen  the  full  measure  of 
the  benefit  of  this  foundation  and  this  condition,  which  were 

1  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  68. 

2  Can  English  Law  be  Taught  at  the  Universities  ?  by  A.  V.  Dicey, 
Vinerian  Professor  of  English  Law  in  the  University  of  Oxford,  1883,  p.  28. 


xiv.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  255 

to  turn  an  eminent  judge  into  a  great  jurist.  If  Story  had 
never  filled  a  Professor's  chair,  in  all  likelihood  we  should  never 
have  had  his  Conflict  of  Laws,  his  Equity  Jurisprudence,  and 
his  Law  of  Agency,  —  that  "  series  of  works  which  are  the  best 
of  their  kind  in  the  English  language."1  During  the  whole  of 
the  year  before  his  appointment  "  there  had  not  been,"  I  quote 
Story  himself,  "  a  single  student.  There  was  no  Law  Library ; 
but  a  few  and  imperfect  books  being  there."  One  long  vaca- 
tion he  wrote  to  the  most  brilliant  of  his  pupils,  Charles 
Sumner :  — 

"  I  have  given  nearly  the  whole  of  last  term,  when  not  on 
judicial  duty,  two  lectures  every  day,  and  even  broke  in  upon 
the  sanctity  of  the  dies  non  juridicus,  Saturday."  Of  this 
daring  innovation  we  have  an  account  from  the  author  of  Two 
Years  before  the  Mast.  The  judge  used  to  make  his  "  boys  " 
—  "'my  boys'  he  always  called  his  pupils"  —  argue  cases 
before  him.  "To  compel  a  recitation  on  Saturday  afternoon," 
writes  Dana,  "  would  have  caused  a  rebellion.  If  a  Moot-court 
had  been  forced  upon  the  Law  School,  no  one  would  have 
attended.  At  the  close  of  a  term  there  was  one  more  case  than 
there  was  an  afternoon  to  hear  it  in,  unless  we  took  Saturday. 
Judge  Story  said  :  " '  Gentlemen,  the  only  time  we  can  hear  this 
case  is  Saturday  afternoon.  This  is  dies  non,  and  no  one  is 
obliged  or  expected  to  attend.  I  am  to  hold  Court  in  Boston 
until  two  o'clock.  I  will  ride  directly  out,  take  a  hasty  dinner, 
and  be  here  by  half-past  three  o'clock,  and  hear  the  case,  if  you 
are  willing.'  He  looked  round  the  school  for  a  reply.  We  felt 
ashamed,  in  our  own  business,  where  we  were  alone  interested, 
to  be  outdone  in  zeal  and  labour  by  this  aged  and  distinguished 

1  Can  English  Law  be  Taught  at  the  Universities?  by  A.  V.  Dicey 
Vinerian  Professor  of  English  Law  in  the  University  of  Oxford,  1883,  p.  29. 


256  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

man,  to  whom  the  case  was  but  child's  play,  a  tale  twice  told, 
and  who  was  himself  pressed  down  by  almost  incredible  labours. 
The  proposal  was  unanimously  accepted.  The  judge  was  on 
the  spot  at  the  hour,  the  school  was  never  more  full,  and  he  sat 
until  late  in  the  evening,  hardly  a  man  leaving  the  room." l 

Among  the  pupils  in  1838  was  Lowell.  "  I  am  reading  Black- 
stone,"  he  wrote,  "with  as  good  a  grace  and  as  few  wry  faces  as  I 
may."  Eight  months  later  he  could  write  more  cheerfully.  "  I 
begin  to  like  the  law.  And  therefore  it  is  quite  interesting.  I  am 
determined  that  I  witt  like  it,  and  therefore  I  do" 2  On  Story's 
death,  in  1845,  tne  school  numbered  one  hundred  and  sixty- 
five  students,  who  had  flocked  to  his  teaching  not  only  from 
New  England,  but  from  almost  every  State  in  the  Union. 
During  the  sixteen  years  in  which  he  filled  the  chair  he  gave 
to  the  world  all  his  treatises  on  the  law,  filling  no  less  than 
thirteen  volumes.  He  had  hoped  that  his  vacant  chair  would 
be  filled  by  Charles  Sumner ;  but  that  young  orator  had  shown 
far  too  radical  a  spirit  to  be  acceptable  to  Harvard  as  it  was  in 
those  days.3  Story's  colleagues  and  successors  were  many  of 
them  men  of  great  eminence.  Among  them  were  Simon  Green- 
leaf,  Joel  Parker,  Benjamin  R.  Curtis,  Theophilus  Parsons,  and 
Emory  Washburn.  Nevertheless,  in  1869,  twenty-four  years 
after  Story's  death,  the  number  of  students  had -fallen  to  one 
hundred  and  fifteen.  In  January,  1870,  a  man  was  appointed 
to  the  chair  which  Story  had  first  filled,  who  has  made  as  deep  a 
mark  as  the  great  jurist  himself,  not  only  on  the  Harvard  Law 
School,  but  on  the  theory  and  practice  of  legal  education 
generally.  He  was  one  of  the  great  lawyers,  who,  either  by  the 

lLife  of  Joseph  Story,  II.  38,  299,  320,  554. 
2  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  I.  33,  45. 
8  Life  of  Charles  Sumner,  III.  u. 


xiv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  257 

unkindness  of  fortune  or  by  the  want  of  one  or  more  of  the 
lower  qualities  of  the  mind,  had  never  been  a  great  advocate. 
"  At  the  bar  of  New  York,  of  which  for  more  than  fifteen  years 
he  had  been  a  member,  not  many  could  be  found  who  had  even 
heard  of  him  ;  he  had  rarely  been  seen  in  the  Courts." l  Presi- 
dent Eliot,  in  his  address  on  the  Law  School  Day  at  the  great 
Commemoration  in  1886,  gives  the  following  account  of  his 
appointment :  "  I  remembered  that  when  I  was  a  Junior  in 
College,  in  the  year  1851-52,  and  used  to  go  often  in  the  early 
evening  to  the  room  of  a  friend  who  was  in  the  Divinity  School, 
I  there  heard  a  young  man  who  was  making  the  notes  to 
Parsens  on  Contracts  talk  about  law.  He  was  generally  eating 
his  supper  at  the  time,  standing  up  in  front  of  the  fire  and  eating 
with  good  appetite  a  bowl  of  brown  bread  and  milk.  I  was  a 
mere  boy,  only  eighteen  years  old ;  but  it  was  given  to  me  to 
understand  that  I  was  listening  to  a  man  of  genius.  In  the 
year  1870  I  recalled  the  remarkable  quality  of  that  young  man's 
expositions,  sought  him  in  New  York,  and  induced  him  to  be- 
come Dane  Professor.  So  he  became  Professor  Langdell.  He 
then  told  me,  in  1870,  a  great  many  of  the  things  he  has  told 
you  this  afternoon.  He  told  me  that  law  was  a  science ;  I  was 
quite  prepared  to  believe  it.  He  told  me  that  the  way  to  study 
a  science  was  to  go  to  the  original  sources.  I  knew  that  was 
true,  for  I  had  been  brought  up  in  the  science  of  chemistry 
myself;  and  one  of  the  first  rules  of  a  conscientious  student  of 
science  is  never  to  take  a  fact  or  a  principle  out  of  second-hand 
treatises,  but  to  go  to  the  original  memoir  of  the  discoverer  of 
that  fact  or  principle.  Out  of  these  two  fundamental  propo- 
sitions—  that  law  is  a  science,  and  that  a  science  is  to  be 
studied  in  its  sources  —  there  gradually  grew,  first,  a  new 

i  The  Green  Bag,  January,  1889,  p.  17. 


258  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

method  of  teaching  law ;  and,  secondly,  a  reconstruction  of  the 
curriculum  of  the  school." 1 

The  method  of  construction  pursued  by  Story  and  Greenleaf 
and  their  successors  had  been  "oral  lectures  illustrating  and 
explaining  a  previously  prescribed  text-reading,  with  more  or 
less  examination  thereon."  No  care  had  ever  been  taken  at 
any  time  to  exclude  those  whose  ignorance  unfitted  them  for 
the  teaching  of  a  university.2  There  was  only  one  course  of 
studies,  and  it  lasted  two  years.  The  students,  therefore,  of 
every  second  year  entered  on  it  when  it  was  half-way  through. 
"  This  system,"  writes  President  Eliot,  "  was  only  justified  by 
poverty,  and  the  convenient,  though  unsound,  theory  that  there 
is  neither  beginning  nor  end  to  the  law,  neither  fundamental 
principles  nor  natural  development." 3  The  ignorant  students 
were  henceforth  to  be  excluded  by  an  entrance  examination  in^ 
Latin  or  French,  in  Blackstone's  Commentaries  (exclusive  of 
editor's  notes) ,  and  in  English  spelling  and  composition.  Those, 
however,  who  had  taken  the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts  at  any 
recognized  university  were  admitted  without  any  test  The 
course  of  instruction  was  lengthened  from  eighteen  months,  first 
to  two  years  and  later  on  to  three.  No  one  can  enter  on  the 
studies  of  the  second  year  who  has  not  passed  his  examinations 
in  the  studies  of  the  first  year,  or  on  the  studies  of  the  third 
year  who  has  not  passed  in  the  studies  of  the  second  year. 
Nevertheless,  the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Laws  is  conferred  after 
a  two  years'  residence  on  those  who  pass  in  the  entire  course  of 
three  years.  Cum  laude  is  added  to  the  degree  of  all  who 
show  "  distinguished  excellence."  Twelve  such  distinctions  are 

1  Harvard  University,  2^oth  Anniversary,  p.  97. 

2  The  Green  Bag,  pp.  17,  18. 

8  Higher  Education,  etc.,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  135. 


xiv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  259 

on   the   average  gained  each  year.      In  1893,  seventy-three 
students  in  all  graduated.1 

Far  beyond  all  the  other  changes  which  followed  on  Pro- 
fessor Langdell's  appointment,  was  the  revolution  made  in 
the  method  of  teaching.  What  this  revolution  was  we  have 
described  in  his  own  words.  In  his  address  at  the  Commemo- 
ration of  1886,  he  said  :  — 

"  It  was  indispensable  to  establish  at  least  two  things :  first,  that  law  is 
a  science;  secondly,  that  all  the  available  materials  of  that  science  are 
contained  in  printed  books.  If  law  be  not  a  science,  a  university  will 
best  consult  its  own  dignity  in  declining  to  teach  it.  If  it  be  not  a 
science,  it  is  a  species  of  handicraft,  and  may  best  be  learned  by  serving 
an  apprenticeship  to  one  who  practises  it.  If  it  be  a  science,  it  will 
scarcely  be  disputed  that  it  is  one  of  the  greatest  and  most  difficult  of 
sciences,  and  that  it  needs  all  the  light  that  the  most  enlightened  seat  of 
learning  can  throw  upon  it.  Again,  law  can  only  be  learned  and  taught 
in  a  university  by  means  of  printed  books.  If,  therefore,  there  are  other 
and  better  means  of  teaching  and  learning  law  than  printed  books,  or  if 
printed  books  can  only  be  used  to  the  best  advantage  in  connection  with 
other  means,  —  for  instance,  the  work  of  a  lawyer's  office,  or  attendance 
upon  the  proceedings  of  Courts  of  Justice,  —  it  must  be  confessed  that 
such  means  cannot  be  provided  by  a  university.  But  if  printed  books  are 
the  ultimate  sources  of  all  legal  knowledge;  if  every  student  who  would 
obtain  any  mastery  of  law  as  a  science  must  resort  to  these  ultimate 
sources;  and  if  the  only  assistance  which  it  is  possible  for  the  learner  to 
receive,  is  such  as  can  be  afforded  by  teachers  who  have  travelled  the  same 
road  before  him  —  then  a  university,  and  a  university  alone,  can  furnish 
every  possible  facility  for  teaching  and  learning  law.  I  wish  to  emphasize 
the  fact  that  a  teacher  of  law  should  be  a  person  who  accompanies  his  pupils 
on  a  road  which  is  new  to  them,  but  with  which  he  is  well  acquainted  from 
having  often  travelled  it  before.  What  qualifies  a  person,  therefore,  to  teach 
law  is  not  experience  in  the  work  of  a  lawyer's  office,  not  experience  in  deal- 
ing with  men,  not  experience  in  the  trial  or  argument  of  causes,  —  not  ex- 
perience, in  short,  in  using  law,  but  experience  in  learning  law;  not  the 
experience  of  the  Roman  advocate  or  of  the  Roman  praetor,  still  less  of  the 
Roman  procurator,  but  the  experience  of  the  Roman  juris-consult."  a 

1  Catalogue,  pp.  346-49,  511. 

2  Harvard  University,  2joth  Anniversary,  p.  85. 


260  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

From  an  article  on  the  Harvard  Law  School,  by  Mr.  Louis  D. 
Brandeis,  one  of  the  foremost  among  the  younger  lawyers  of 
Boston,  I  extract  the  following  account  of  the  method  by 
which  Professor  Langdell  "  teaches  the  student  to  think  in  a 
legal  manner  in  accordance  with  the  principles  of  the  particu- 
lar branch  of  the  law."  Mr.  Brandeis  begins  by  quoting  the 
following  passage  from  the  Professor's  Select  Cases  on  Con- 
tracts, the  first  of  a  series  published  for  the  use  of  the  School. 

"  Law,  considered  as  a  science,  consists  of  certain  principles  or  doc- 
trines. To  have  such  a  mastery  of  these  as  to  be  able  to  apply  them  with 
constant  facility  and  certainty  to  the  ever-tangled  skein  of  human  affairs, 
is  what  constitutes  a  true  lawyer;  and  hence  to  acquire  that  mastery 
should  be  the  business  of  every  earnest  student  of  the  law.  Each  of  these 
doctrines  has  arrived  at  its  present  state  by  slow  degrees ;  in  other  words, 
it  is  a  growth,  extending  in  many  cases  through  centuries.  This  growth  is 
to  be  traced  in  the  main  through  a  series  of  cases;  and  much  the  shortest 
and  best,  if  not  the  only  way  of  mastering  the  doctrine  effectually  is  by 
studying  the  cases  in  which  it  is  embodied.  But  the  cases  which  are  use- 
ful and  necessary  for  this  purpose  at  the  present  day  bear  an  exceedingly 
small  proportion  to  all  that  have  been  reported.  The  vast  majority  are 
useless  and  worse  than  useless  for  any  purpose  of  systematic  study.  More- 
over, the  number  of  fundamental  legal  doctrines  is  much  less  than  is  com- 
monly supposed;  the  many  different  guises  in  which  the  same  doctrine  is 
constantly  making  its  appearance,  and  the  great  extent  to  which  legal 
treatises  are  a  repetition  of  each  other,  being  the  cause  of  much  misap- 
prehension. If  these  doctrines  could  be  so  classified  and  arranged  that 
each  should  be  found  in  its  proper  place,  and  nowhere  else,  they  would 
cease  to  be  formidable  from  their  number." 

"These  books  of  cases,"  Mr.  Brandeis  goes  on  to  say,  "are  the  tools 
with  which  the  student  supplies  himself  as  he  enters  upon  his  work. 
Take,  for  instance,  the  subject  of  '  Mutual  Assent'  in  contracts.  A  score 
of  cases  covering  a  century,  contained  in  about  one  hundred  and  fifty 
pages  and  selected  from  the  English  reports,  the  decisions  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States,  and  the  highest  courts  of  New  York,  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  Massachusetts,  arranged  in  chronological  order,  show  the  devel- 
opment of  its  leading  principles.  Before  coming  to  the  lecture-room,  the 
student,  by  way  of  preparation,  has  studied  —  he  does  not  merely  read  — 
say  from  two  to  six  cases.  In  the  selection  of  cases  used  as  a  text-book, 


XIV.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  261 

the  head  notes  appearing  in  the  regular  reports  are  omitted,  and  the 
student,  besides  mastering  the  facts,  has  endeavoured  for  himself  to  deduce 
from  the  decision  the  principle  involved.  In  the  class-room  some  student 
is  called  upon  by  the  Professor  to  state  the  case,  and  then  follows  an 
examination  of  the  opinion  of  the  court,  an  analysis  of  the  arguments  of 
counsel,  a  criticism  of  the  reasoning  on  which  the  decision  is  based,  a 
careful  discrimination  between  what  was  decided  and  what  is  a  dictum 
merely.  To  use  the  expression  of  one  of  the  Professors,  the  case  is  "  evis- 
cerated." Other  students  are  either  called  upon  for  their  opinions  or 
volunteer  them,  —  the  Professor  throughout  acting  largely  as  moderator. 
When  the  second  case  is  taken  up,  material  for  comparison  is  furnished; 
and  with  each  additional  authority  that  is  examined,  the  opportunity  for 
comparison  and  for  generalization  grows.  When  the  end  of  the  chapter 
of  cases  is  reached,  the  student  stands  possessed  of  the  principles  in  their 
full  development."  1 

Mr.  Brandeis  describes  "the  ardour  of  the  students.  Pro- 
fessor Ames,  writing  of  the  School  ten  years  ago,  said  :  '  Indeed, 
one  speaks  far  within  bounds  in  saying  that  the  spirit  of  work 
and  enthusiasm  which  now  prevails  is  without  parallel  in  the 
history  of  any  department  of  the  University.'  What  was  true 
then  is  at  least  equally  true  now.  The  students  live  in  an 
atmosphere  of  legal  thought.  Their  interest  is  at  fever  heat." 
One  of  the  Professors  informed  me  that  nine  out  of  ten  of  his 
pupils  study  hard.  If  they  had  had  a  period  of  idleness  at  the 
University,  it  was  in  their  Arts  course.  The  entrance  into  the 
Law  School  they  looked  upon  as  the  entrance  into  the  real 
work  of  life.  The  idlers  are  weeded  out  each  year  by  an 
examination ;  but  of  these  there  are  always  very  few. 

There  is  the  freest  access  to  a  noble  Law  Library  of  thirty- 
three  thousand  volumes.  On  it  in  each  year  between  1870  and 
1890  about  three  thousand  dollars  (^613)  were  spent.  Great 
as  this  annual  expenditure  was,  it  has  not  been  found  sufficient. 
In  the  last  three  years  it  has  been  nearly  doubled.2  In  1892 

1  The  Green.  Bag,  January,  1889,  p.  19.  2  Catalogue,  p.  351. 


262  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

it  was  thought  needful  to  add  "  another  copy  of  every  set  of 
English  and  American  reports  which  is  used  to  any  consider- 
able extent."  In  the  summer  vacation  of  that  year  the  Libra- 
rian took  a  trip  to  England  and  purchased  nearly  fourteen 
hundred  volumes  of  English  reports.  Before  long  "  the  Library 
will  have  three  copies  of  all  the  more  important  sets  of  English 
and  American  reports,  and  of  several  sets  it  will  have  four 
copies."1  "We  have  constantly  inculcated  the  idea,"  said 
Professor  Langdell,  "  that  the  Library  is  the  proper  workshop 
of  Professors  and  students  alike ;  that  it  is  to  us  all  that  the 
Laboratories  of  the  University  are  to  the  chemists  and  physi- 
cists, all  that  the  Museum  of  Natural  History  is  to  the  zoolo- 
gists, all  that  the  Botanical  Garden  is  to  the  botanists."  2 

In  two  different  courts  the  students  are  trained  both  in  law 
and  in  arguing,  —  in  Moot  Courts  held  by  the  Professors,  artf 
in  Club  Courts  conducted  entirely  by  the  students.  "The 
Club  Courts  have  generally  two  sets  of  members  —  the  Junior 
Court  consisting  of  eight  members  selected  from  the  first-year 
Class,  and  the  Senior  Court  consisting  of  nine  members  selected 
from  the  second-year  Class.  At  each  sitting  a  case  is  argued 
by  two  of  the  members  as  counsel,  the  rest  sitting  as  judges. 
In  the  Junior  Court  a  member  of  the  Senior  Court  sits  as  Chief 
Justice.  The  cases  are  regularly  presented  upon  the  pleadings  ; 
briefs  are  prepared,  arguments  made,  and  opinions  —  some- 
times in  writing  —  delivered  by  each  of  the  judges.  The  cases 
are  prepared  with  quite  as  much  thoroughness  as  any  work 
that  is  done  at  the  School."8 

Nothing  better  shows  the  excellence  of  the  teaching  than  the 

1  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  143. 

2  Harvard  University,  2$oth  Anniversary,  p.  86. 
8  The  Green  Bag,  p.  23. 


xiv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  263 

position  held  by  the  Harvard  Law  Review.  It  is  managed 
wholly  by  the  students ;  their  notes  on  legal  topics  are,  I  am 
told,  some  of  its  best  features.  Among  its  contributors  it 
reckons  not  a  few  of  the  foremost  legal  thinkers  both  of  Eng- 
land and  America.  It  is  about  to  enter  on  its  eighth  volume ; 
it  has  accumulated  a  reserve  fund,  and  is  in  a  perfectly  sound 
financial  condition. 

The  Faculty  is  composed  of  six  Professors,  two  Assistant- 
Professors,  two  Lecturers  and  one  Instructor,  by  whom  forty- 
eight  lectures  are  delivered  every  week.  They  are  not  men 
engaged  in  other  occupations,  who  dwell  at  a  distance,  and 
hurry  down  from  time  to  time  to  give  one  or  two  hasty  lect- 
ures. They  all  live  close  to  the  College,  and  "they  almost 
without  exception  devote  their  entire  time  to  the  work  of  the 
School,  and  the  personal  needs  of  the  students."  "I  have 
seen,"  said  President  Eliot,  "four  Professors  added  to  the 
Faculty  of  Law  since  Professor  Langdell's  accession ;  if  genius 
be  a  remarkable  capacity  for  work,  they  are  all  men  of 
genius." * 

It  is  the  great  desire,  not  only  of  the  Governing  Bodies  in 
general,  but  also  of  the  Faculty  of  the  Law  School,  that  all 
who  study  in  it  should  first  have  graduated  in  Arts.  In  Oxford 
so  strongly  is  it  felt  by  some  of  the  Law  Professors  that  the 
School  of  Literse  Humaniores  best  disciplines  the  mind,  that, 
if  a  man  destined  for  the  Bar  has  to  choose  between  it  and  the 
Law  School,  they  always  advise  him  to  follow  the  wider  instead 
of  the  narrower  course.  He  had  better,  they  think,  learn  all 
his  law  in  a  barrister's  chambers  than  miss  the  best  part  of  a 
liberal  training.  Professor  Goodwin,  with  all  his  admiration 
of  the  learning  and  the  research  of  German  universities,  yet 

1  Harvard  University,  s^oth  Anniversary,  p.  98. 


264  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

sees  how  in  regard  to  "  a  purely  liberal  education  "  they  are 
surpassed  by  those  of  England  and  America.  "A  German," 
he  writes,  "  passes  by  a  single  leap  from  the  life  of  a  school- 
boy to  that  of  a  man  who  is  (or  ought  to  be)  beginning  the 
serious  work  of  life.  He  knows  no  period  of  transition  such 
as  is  open  to  the  English  and  American  youth,  when  his  ship  is 
loosed  from  shore  but  is  still  in  harbour,  when  he  is  in  the 
world  but  not  exactly  of  the  world,  when  he  has  a  right  to 
spend  his  time  in  becoming  acquainted  with  the  great  heritage 
which  has  been  bequeathed  him  before  he  is  called  to  admin- 
ister it  and  improve  it  for  his  successors.  To  this  habit  of  our 
English  race  of  taking  a  period  of  rest  combined  with  most 
active  work,  of  active  work  free  from  the  responsibilites  of  real 
life,  between  boyhood  and  manhood,  we  owe  much  that  gives 
the  English  and  American  college-bred  man  his  distinct  char-, 
acter,  which  often  makes  him  a  more  cultivated  man  than  one 
of  a  different  stamp  with  perhaps  far  greater  learning." l 

True  as  this  is,  unless  our  students  who  are  intended  for  the 
Bar  or  the  Solicitor's  Office  stay  on  at  our  universities  and 
study  law  as  a  science,  their  education  will  always  be  maimed 
and  imperfect.  We  must  follow  in  Professor  LangdelPs  steps, 
and  establish  a  School  in  which  that  natural  impatience  which 
comes  over  the  best  minds,  by  the  end  of  their  undergraduates' 
course,  to  enter  on  the  real  work  of  life,  shall  be  satisfied.  To 
do  this,  our  short  terms  and  frequent  vacations  must  come  to 
an  end.  The  real  work  of  life  is  not  carried  on  in  twenty-five 
weeks  of  each  year  divided  into  three  periods,  separated  by 
vacations,  the  shortest  of  which  lasts  at  least  a  month.  There 
must  be,  as  at  Harvard,  the  long  sweep  of  work  from  the  end 
of  September  to  the  end  of  June,  broken  only  by  a  few  days' 

1  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  33. 


Xiv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  265 

rest  at  Christmas  and  Easter.  The  gain  will  be  twofold  —  a 
gain  in  the  steadiness  of  work  and  in  its  amount.  By  the  end 
of  his  three  years'  course  the  student  will  have  had,  not 
seventy-two  weeks  of  study  broken  up  into  nine  periods,  but 
one  hundred  and  eleven  weeks  divided  into  three.  When 
once  we  have  a  well-organized  School  and  a  large  staff  of  Pro- 
fessors all  inspired  with  that  spirit  which  animates  these  New 
England  teachers,  and  all  gifted  with  that  genius  which  consists 
in  a  remarkable  capacity  for  work,  we  shall  soon  have  a  body 
of  students  equally  inspired  and  equally  gifted.  The  School 
will  grow  with  the  rapidity  of  which  Harvard  boasts ;  in  the 
ten  years  between  1882  and  1892,  it  saw  its  students  of  law 
increase  in  number  from  one  hundred  and  thirty-one  to  three 
hundred  and  ninety-four.  Stricter  measures  which  were  taken 
two  years  ago  to  exclude  incompetent  men  have,  for  a  time, 
caused  a  slight  check ;  in  the  present  year  there  are  but  three 
hundred  and  fifty-three  on  the  list.  Of  these  rather  more  than 
seven  in  every  ten  have  taken  a  degree  in  Arts.  In  1891-92, 
for  the  first  time,  the  Harvard  graduates  were  outnumbered 
by  the  graduates  of  all  the  other  universities  combined.  Yale 
sent  twenty-one.  The  average  age  at  entrance  was  a  few  weeks 
under  twenty- three.1  In  America,  as  in  England,  youths  at  the 
present  day  make  too  long  a  stay  at  school,  entering  upon 
their  university  life  at  least  a  year  too  late. 

Daniel  Webster,  in  one  of  his  speeches,  looks  forward  to  the 
time  when  America  shall  repay  to  Europe  the  great  debt  of 
learning  which  she  owes  her.  The  repayment  to  England  has 
already  begun ;  all  that  we  have  to  do  is  to  stretch  out  our 
hands  and  to  gather  in  the  fruits  of  Harvard's  experience  in 
the  method  of  teaching  law. 

1  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  69. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

The  Lawrence  Scientific  School.  —  Special  Students. 

THE  growth  of  the  Scientific  School  has  been  more  rapid 
even  than  that  of  the  Law  School.  "It  has  to-day 
twenty  times  as  many  students  as  it  had  seven  years  ago."  In 
1886  they  were  but  fourteen  in  number;  now  they  are  two 
hundred  and  eighty.1  It  was  founded  in  1847  by  a  noble  gift 
of  Mr.  Abbott  Lawrence,  but  it  was  long  in  taking  root.  It 
was  in  the  department  of  Natural  History  that  it  made  its  first 
great  start.  "  Nothing,"  says  Professor  Goodwin,  "  rouses  a 
stronger  opposition  to  any  scheme  for  university  reform  than 
the  charge  that  it  is  foreign."2  Happily  there  is  not  appa- 
rently the  same  jealousy  of  foreigners ;  for  it  was  the  Swiss 
Agassiz,  who  had  been  trained  in  the  best  methods  of  the  great 
German  universities,  who  by  his  genius,  his  ardent  love  of 
knowledge  and  his  persuasive  eloquence,  stirred  up  the  citizens 
of  Boston  and  the  Legislature  of  the  Commonwealth  to  found 
the  University  Museum.  It  would  have  been  in  itself  a  noble 
monument  to  his  memory,  but  to  render  it  still  worthier  his  son, 
Professor  Alexander  Agassiz,  has  laid  out  on  it  at  his  own  cost 
more  than  a  quarter  of  a  million  of  dollars.  "There  is,"  says 
President  Eliot,  "  no  institution  in  the  world  which  offers  richer 
and  more  varied  opportunities  for  the  study  of  Natural  History 

1  Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  7. 

2  The  Present  and  Future  of  Harvard  College,  p.  21. 

266 


CHAP.  xv.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  267 

than  the  Lawrence  Scientific  School." l  Nevertheless,  owing 
apparently  to  defects  in  organization,  the  number  of  students 
had  of  late  years  fallen  away.  Up  to  1890  it  had  been  "as 
distinct  a  professional  school  as  the  Law  School  or  the  Medical 
School.  Since  its  consolidation  with  the  other  two  depart- 
ments under  the  Faculty  of  Arts  and  Sciences,  it  has  grown 
with  great  rapidity.  Its  students  work  side  by  side  under  one 
Faculty,  play  on  the  same  teams,  row  in  the  same  boats,  and 
mingle  freely  in  the  same  societies."2  Of  the  two  hundred 
and  eighty  students,  one  hundred  and  forty-two  entered  with 
the  intention  of  taking  the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Science, 
while  the  rest  either  resorted  to  the  School  for  the  sake  of 
pursuing  some  particular  study,  or  did  not  propose  to  go 
through  the  four  years'  course.3  The  entrance  examination  is 
easier  for  the  young  students  of  Science  than  for  one  who 
intends  to  take  his  degree  in  Arts.  On  the  other  hand,  when 
he  is  once  in,  more  work  is  required  of  him,  and  more  is  freely 
done.  "  As  a  rule,"  says  the  President,  "  there  is  more  of  the 
spirit  of  hard  work  in  the  Scientific  Schools  or  Courses  than 
in  the  Colleges  or  College  Departments  of  Universities.  The 
motive  of  earning  a  livelihood  presses  more  constantly,  and 
the  students  feel  more  distinctly  that  they  are  beginning  their 
life  work."4  The  candidates  for  a  degree  work  at  one  of 
"  seven  compactly  arranged  groups  of  subjects."  All  either  at 
entrance  or,  if  they  prefer,  at  the  end  of  their  course  must 
pass  an  examination  in  English.  Those  taking  their  degree 
this  year  have  to  satisfy  the  examiners  that  they  have  "  read 

1  History  of  Higher  Education,  etc.,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  pp.  117-18. 

2  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  59. 

8  Catalogue,  p.  246;   Annual  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  104. 
*  Annual  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  22;   Ib.  1892-93,  p.  II. 


268  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

intelligently  Shakespeare's  Julius  Casar  and  Merchant  of 
Venice,  Scott's  Lady  of  the  Lake,  Arnold's  Sohrab  and  Rustum, 
the  "  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  Papers  "  in  The  Spectator,  Macau- 
lay's  Second  Essay  on  the  Earl  of  Chatham,  Emerson's  Ameri- 
can Scholar,  Irving's  Sketch-Book,  Scott's  Abbot,  Dickens's 
David  Copperfield." x 

This  School  is  open  to  undergraduates  in  general ;  some  of 
the  courses  counting  for  the  degree,  either  of  Bachelor  of  Arts 
or  of  Bachelor  of  Medicine.  Dr.  Goodale,  Professor  of 
Natural  History,  told  me  that  last  year  two  hundred  students 
in  all  attended  his  classes  on  Botany.  His  lecture-room  is 
admirably  fitted  up.  In  one  part  of  the  Museum  he  showed 
me  long  cases  full  of  wonderful  imitations  of  plants  in  glass, 
so  perfect  that  they  stand  the  test  of  the  microscope.  They 
are  the  productions  of  a  father  and  son  named  Blaschka,  who 
belong  to  a  family  long  settled  in  Germany,  which  for  many 
generations  has  produced  skilful  workers  in  glass.  I  was  told 
that  when  the  son  paid  a  visit  to  America,  and  saw  in  the  Har- 
vard Museum  these  flowers  thus  displayed,  and  his  name  and 
his  father's  inscribed  on  the  walls,  the  tears  came  into  his  eyes. 
One  of  the  Professor's  pupils  had  lately  made  a  minute  exami- 
nation of  the  weeds  on  a  small  plot  of  ground.  Scarcely  a 
single  one  of  nearly  seventy  varieties  was  of  American  origin. 
The  European  seeds  get  as  great  a  mastery  over  the  native 
seeds  as  the  white  men  got  over  the  red. 

For  the  last  twenty  years,  during  six  weeks  of  the  Long 
Vacation,  the  College  has  been  open  to  students,  whether  they 
are  members  of  the  University  or  outsiders.  The  Summer 
Courses,  as  they  are  called,  include  instruction  in  German, 
French,  English,  Anglo-Saxon,  engineering,  physics,  chemistry, 

1  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  58;    Catalogue,  p.  247. 


xv.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  269 

botany,  geology,  mathematics,  and  physical  training.  In  the 
Medical  School,  moreover,  "courses  in  many  branches  of 
practical  and  scientific  medicine  are  given."  Last  year  three 
hundred  and  forty-six  students  in  all  attended,  of  whom  a  large 
proportion  were  teachers.  The  summer  school  vacation,  it 
must  be  remembered,  is  much  longer  in  the  United  States  than 
in  England.  Of  these  three  hundred  and  forty-six,  two  hun- 
dred and  forty-three  were  men  and  one  hundred  and  three 
were  women.1  I  doubt  whether  at  Oxford,  in  the  Long  Vaca- 
tion Extension  Lectures,  the  men  form  a  tenth  part  of  the 
whole  number.  The  work  done  at  Harvard  spreads  over  a 
much  longer  time  and  is  more  serious.  There  is  nothing  of  a 
literary  picnic  about  these  Summer  Courses.  The  teaching  is 
mainly  done  by  "the  younger  instructors  and  assistants  who 
have  become  familiar  with  the  ground  covered  during  their 
regular  labours  in  term-time  under  the  guidance  of  the  older 
teachers  in  the  same  department.  A  few  Assistant-  Professors 
take  part  in  the  work  ;  but  no  Professors  —  except  perhaps  by 
giving  a  few  lectures  during  the  progress  of  some  course  in  which 
they  are  interested."  Some  of  the  instruction  given  is  of  a 
high  order.  Thus  in  history  this  year  one  of  the  Courses  "  is 
open  only  to  experienced  teachers  and  students  already  well 
prepared  in  American  History.  They  will  do  daily  work  in 
the  Library  on  a  special  subject  under  the  direction  of  the  In- 
structor." The  ordinary  fee  for  each  Course  is  twenty  dollars 
(^4.  i.  8.),  but  for  one  or  two  of  the  subjects  so  much  as  thirty 
or  even  thirty-five  dollars  (£6.  2.  6.  ;  £7.  3.  o.)  is  charged.2 


2 


1  Of  the  354  names  in  the  Catalogue,  249  are  those  of  men  and  105  of 
women.      Eight  are  inserted  in  more  than  one  list.      I  have  assumed  that 
of  these  eight  six  were  men  and  two  women.     Catalogue,  pp.  446,  538. 

2  Annual  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  39  ;    Catalogue,  pp.  118,  401,  445. 


270  HARVARD   COLLEGE. 


CHAP. 


Harvard,  in  her  eagerness  to  promote  learning,  freely  receives 
students  who  for  want  of  means  or  time  cannot  go  through  the 
ordinary  four  years'  course,  but  who,  nevertheless,  wish  to  pursue 
some  particular  study  at  a  university.  These  men  are  known 
as  Special  Students.  Before  admittance  they  must  give  proof 
that  they  have  learning  enough  to  profit  by  the  teaching.  In 
their  work  they  are  under  the  control  of  the  Committee  of 
Advisers,  and  in  respect  to  discipline  they  are  on  the  same 
footing  as  the  ordinary  undergraduates.  A  watchful  eye  has  to 
be  kept  over  this  department  lest  it  should  be  used  by  those 
who  look  upon  a  university  as  a  great  and  glorious  play-ground. 
Idlers  are  sent  away.  To  those  who  do  well  Certificates  of 
Proficiency  are  given  on  Commencement  Day.  This  year  there 
are  one  hundred  and  sixty-two  of  these  students.1  I  hope  that 
the  day  will  shortly  come  when  in  our  English  Universities  also 
we  shall  freely  admit  in  every  department  the  eager  learner, 
however  great  may  be  his  ignorance  of  certain  subjects.  When 
I  consider  the  scores  and  scores  of  young  men  who  throng  the 
Colleges  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  who  are  no  more  fit  to  be 
in  a  university  than  a  cow  is  fit  to  be  in  a  garden,  I  am  amazed 
at  the  care  which  is  taken  to  bar  out  many  a  promising  student. 
This  barrier  is  raised  by  those  who  have  never  looked  upon  a 
university  but  as  a  place  where  a  degree  is  earned,  and  on  a 
degree  but  as  a  distinction  inseparably  connected  with  some 
knowledge  of  Greek  and  Latin.  In  their  eyes  education  is 
nothing  but  a  narrow  and  well-beaten  track  which  all  men  have 
followed  or  ought  to  have  followed.  Those  who  have  travelled 
along  it,  whether  freely  or  cudgelled  at  every  step,  are  alone  fit 
for  the  liberal  studies  of  a  university.  They  may  be  dull,  gross, 
lazy,  haters  of  knowledge,  scorners  of  learned  men ;  their  chief 

1  Catalogue,  pp.  187,  207;  Annual  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  75. 


XV.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  271 

delight  may  be  in  the  strength  of  their  own  or  of  other  men's 
legs ;  they  may,  unless  under  compulsion,  read  nothing  but  the 
sporting  newspapers ;  they  may  be  ever  startling  the  studious 
cloisters  by  their  boisterous  ignorance ;  "  flown  with  insolence 
and  wine,"  they  may  do  shameful  wrong  to  ancient  seats  of 
learning,  nevertheless  before  them  the  barriers  have  been 
rightly  lowered,  because  in  the  ten  long  years  spent  at  school 
they  have  been  birched  into  Greek  and  Latin  enough  to  carry 
them,  with  the  help  of  the  "  crammer,"  through  their  examina- 
tions. While  such  men  not  only  disgrace  the  university  but 
lower  the  general  standard,  others  are  shut  out  who  would  have 
brought  to  it  new  interests  and  modes  of  life  and  fresh  thoughts. 
How  often  does  it  happen  that  a  young  man  who,  like  Gold- 
smith, flowers  late,  suddenly  wakens  up  to  all  the  delight  and 
hopefulness  of  knowledge !  Some  one  study  above  all  he  longs 
to  pursue.  He  seeks  such  aid  as  he  can  get,  and  learns  all  that 
he  can  from  books  and  chance  instructors.  The  time  comes 
when  he  feels  the  need  of  all  the  means  of  learning  which  a 
great  university  alone  can  give.  He  strives  to  enter,  but  he  is 
coldly  repulsed.  He  is  told  that  if  in  his  ignorance  of  Greek  or 
Latin,  or  perchance  of  our  English  arithmetic  with  its  ridiculous 
tables  of  weight  and  measures,  he  were  let  in,  a  blow  would  be 
struck  at  the  whole  system  of  public  education,  over  which  the 
University  presumes  to  watch  with  all  the  conceit  of  a  hen  over 
a  brood  of  ducklings.  Surely  it  will  be  time  enough  to  exclude 
those  who  only  wish  to  learn  something  and  not  everything 
when  all  have  been  excluded  who  so  far  from  wishing  to  learn 
everything  learn  nothing.  Let  every  one  who  wishes  to  enter 
the  University  satisfy  the  Faculty  of  any  single  department  that 
he  has  knowledge  and  capacity  enough  to  profit  by  the  teaching, 
the  door  should  at  once  be  flung  open  to  him.  If  he  shows  him- 


272  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  xv. 

self  unworthy  of  his  great  opportunities,  let  him  be  quickly  sent 
packing.  When  once  he  is  inside,  mixing  with  men  of  great 
and  varied  knowledge,  he  will  see  his  sky  widening  on  all  sides 
and  will  find  fresh  longings  for  knowledge  springing  up  in  him. 
He  should  be  placed  on  the  same  footing  as  the  other  under- 
graduates —  entitled  to  enjoy  the  same  privileges  and  advant- 
ages, and  subject  to  the  same  discipline.  If  the  course  of 
studies  that  he  pursues  is  too  narrow,  let  no  degree  be  con- 
ferred upon  him.  Nevertheless,  as  at  Harvard,  he  should  re- 
ceive a  certificate  of  proficiency,  which  should  testify,  not  only 
that  he  has  acquired  a  certain  amount  of  knowledge,  but 
—  which  is  of  scarcely  less  importance  —  that  he  has  acquired 
it  during  his  residence  in  a  learned  society. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

Radcliffe  College. — The  Harvard  Annex. 

ON  April  23,  1849,  Longfellow  recorded  in  his  Journal: 
"  We  have  had  at  Faculty  meeting  an  application  from 
a  young  lady  to  enter  College  as  a  regular  student."  l  Who 
she  was,  and  what  answer  was  sent  to  her  request,  we  are  not 
told.  In  some  remote  day  the  antiquary  will  search  the 
archives  of  the  College  in  the  hope  of  discovering  her  applica- 
tion, and  of  making  known  to  the  world  the  name  of  the  girl, 
who,  a  full  half  century  in  advance  of  her  time,  took  this 
daring  step.  Even  now,  much  as  has  been  done,  no  woman 
can  enter  Harvard  as  a  regular  student.  This  young  lady  will 
be  looked  on  as  the  Pilgrim  Mother  of  Radcliffe  College,  or 
rather,  perhaps,  as  one  of  the  daring  adventurers  from  Norway, 
who  first  tried  to  settle  on  the  inhospitable  shores  of  New  Eng- 
land. Nearly  thirty  years  later  a  second  young  lady  came  to 
Cambridge,  and  was  fortunate  enough  to  get  instruction  in 
Greek,  Latin,  and  English  from  three  sound  scholars,  Professors 
Goodwin,  Greenough,  and  Child.  "  By  her  ability  and  enthusi- 
asm for  learning,  she  aroused  in  her  teachers  great  interest  in 
the  whole  subject  of  woman's  education."  J  By  Mr.  Arthur 
Gilman,  neither  a  teacher  nor  a  graduate  of  Harvard,  the  sug- 

1  Life  offf.  W.  Longfellow,  II.  138. 

2  See  an  article  on  "  Radcliffe  College  "  in  the  Harvard  Graduate? 
Magazine  for  March,  1894,  of  which  I  have  made  much  use  in  writing 
this  chapter. 

T  273 


274  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

gestion  was  thereupon  made  "  that  instruction  should  be  sys- 
tematically and  publicly,  though  unofficially,  offered  to  women 
by  the  College  teachers."  He  was  supported  in  his  proposal 
by  the  example  which  had  been  recently  set  in  England  by  the 
foundation  of  Girton  College.  To  the  English  Cambridge 
the  New  England  Cambridge  once  more  turned  her  eyes. 
"The  proposition,"  we  are  told,  "might  well  have  seemed 
impracticable,  but  it  was  not  without  the  countenance  of  foreign 
example."  A  second  College  for  women  was  soon  founded  on 
the  banks  of  the  Cam,  and  Oxford  quickly  followed  with  her 
two  Halls.  Not  to  be  left  behind  in  the  race,  a  few  ladies  of 
the  New  England  Cambridge  published  a  circular  in  which 
they  unfolded  their  plan  for  the  "  Private  Collegiate  Instruction 
of  Women."  A  sum  of  fifteen  thousand  dollars  (,£3066), 
far  too  small  to  found  a  College,  but  large  enough  to  try  a 
great  experiment  in  education,  was  subscribed  by  a  few  friends. 
The  instruction  that  was  offered  was  not  to  be  "  of  a  lower 
grade  than  that  given  to  the  College,"  and  the  entrance  exami- 
nation was  to  be  the  same  as  that  through  which  the  under- 
graduates had  to  pass.  The  teaching  of  the  two  sexes  was 
to  be  kept  apart.  "Thirty-seven  Professors  and  Instructors 
offered  courses,  and  among  them  many  of  the  most  distin- 
guished teachers  of  the  University."  In  September,  1879, 
twenty-seven  students  began  their  work  in  rooms  hired  in  a 
dwelling-house  on  the  Appian  Way.  "  An  extra  room  was  pro- 
vided where  students  could  spend  the  intervals  between  reci- 
tations, and  in  that  room  some  of  the  Instructors  left  books 
of  reference  for  their  use." 

In  the  second  year  the  number  of  students  rose  to  forty- 
seven  ;  by  the  third  year  the  Managers  felt  that  they  were 
strong  enough  to  form  themselves  into  a  Corporation  under 


xvi.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  275 

the  title  of  the  Society  for  the  Collegiate  Instruction  of  Women. 
Mr.  Gilman  was  appointed  Secretary,  and  Mrs.  Agassiz,  the 
widow  of  the  great  naturalist,  President.  To  their  wise  zeal, 
kept  at  the  same  even  height  from  year  to  year,  the  success  of 
this  great  cause  is  largely  due.  It  was  not  by  the  long  name 
which  the  Society  had  chosen  for  itself  that  the  institution  was 
to  be  known.  A  nickname  sprang  up,  as  nicknames  always  do 
spring  up  where  brevity  has  been  neglected.  The  Society  for 
the  Collegiate  Instruction  of  Women,  and  the  building  in 
which  its  work  is  done,  have  long  been  everywhere  known  as 
the  Harvard  Annex,  or  more  briefly  as  the  Annex.  By  the 
end  of  the  first  four  years  three  of  the  students  had  finished 
the  complete  undergraduate  course  "parallel  to  that  of  the 
College,  directed  by  the  same  teachers,  and  tested  by  identical 
examinations.  They  received,  instead  of  degrees,  the  certifi- 
cates of  the  Society,  which  stated  that  the  holder  '  has  pur- 
sued a  course  of  study  equivalent  in  amount  and  quality  to 
that  for  which  the  degree  of  Bachelor  of  Arts  is  conferred  in 
Harvard  College,  and  has  passed  in  a  satisfactory  manner 
examinations  on  that  course,  corresponding  to  the  College 
examinations.'  The  graduate  certificate  has  ever  since  been 
in  that  form." 

By  this  time  the  Society  had  successfully  gone  through  its 
first  period  of  probation,  and  could  now  appeal  for  support  to 
the  country  at  large.  The  appeal  should  have  met  with  a 
liberal  reply,  for  the  need  of  a  higher  education  of  women 
ought  to  be  more  strongly  felt  in  the  United  States  than  per- 
haps in  any  other  country  of  the  world.  The  great  majority 
of  American  teachers  are  women ;  in  the  larger  cities,  in  every 
hundred  scarcely  ten  are  men.  It  is,  no  doubt,  not  a  little 
owing  to  this  fact,  and  to  the  imperfect  education  which 


276  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

women  have  hitherto  received,  that  the  American  schoolboy  is 
behind  the  schoolboys  of  England,  France,  and  Germany  in 
book-learning.  In  answer  to  the  appeal,  not  more  than  sixty- 
seven  thousand  dollars  (,£13,700)  was  raised  —  a  small  sum 
compared  with  the  splendid  donations  made  year  after  year  to 
Harvard  for  the  education  of  men.  Donors  and  bequeathers 
follow  the  general  fashion  and  move  in  one  long  rut ;  giving 
and  bequeathing  where  gifts  and  bequests  have  always  been 
made.  May  some  millionaire,  for  once,  be  touched  with  orig- 
inality, and  make  his  great  gift  to  this  College  for  Women  ! 

The  students  soon  became  too  numerous  for  the  few  hired 
rooms  in  which  their  work  was  done.  In  1 885  an  old  mansion 
was  bought,  facing  the  pleasant  Common  and  close  to  the 
Washington  Elm.  Washington's  Birthday  had  been  the  date  of 
the  first  circular  issued  six  years  earlier  by  the  Managers.  In 
one  of  the  rooms  of  this  house  the  poet  of  the  two  hundredth 
anniversary  of  the  College  had  written  his  Fair  Harvard. 
Hitherto  the  students  had  had  no  life  in  common ;  they  had 
come  together  to  be  taught,  and  had  separated  when  once  the 
lesson  was  over.  In  their  new  home,  with  the  great  additions 
which  before  long  were  made,  they  were  to  have  an  accommo- 
dation not  unworthy  of  a  small  college.  They  were  still,  how- 
ever, to  lodge  as  before,  scattered  about  in  private  families. 
Their  number  has  grown  in  fifteen  years  from  twenty-seven  to 
two  hundred  and  fifty ;  of  whom  one  hundred  are  taking  the 
full  undergraduate  course  of  four  years.  The  Academic  Board 
is  composed  of  eight  of  the  principal  Professors  of  Harvard, 
together  with  the  President  and  Secretary  of  the  Society.  The 
work  of  instruction  is  done  by  sixty-nine  of  the  Harvard 
teachers,  of  whom  twenty-one  are  full  Professors  and  fifteen 
Assistant- Professors. 


XVL  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  277 

Much  as  the  University  has  done,  it  is  a  pity  that  it  has  not 
had  the  courage  to  do  still  more.  From  all  the  lecture-rooms, 
from  almost  all  the  Laboratories,  and  from  the  Medical  School 
the  women  are  still  excluded.  The  exclusion  from  the  lecture- 
rooms  tells  not  only  against  the  pupil  but  against  the  teacher, 
who  has  felt  the  weariness  of  repeating  before  a  class  of  young 
women  the  lecture  which  perhaps  that  same  morning  he  had 
delivered  before  a  class  of  young  men.  Harvard  has  not  even 
the  timid  courage  which  the  Managers  of  our  Oxford  Halls 
showed  from  the  first.  They  allowed  their  girls  to  enter  the 
lecture-rooms  of  the  University  Professors  and  of  the  College 
Tutors,  so  long  as  each  set  was  accompanied  by  a  chaperon. 
It  was  not  the  University  of  Oxford  which  made  this  regulation, 
though  it  is  still  sometimes  enforced  by  nervous  Professors. 
The  University,  as  such,  had  no  fear  of  its  young  men  as  the 
Corporation  and  Overseers  of  Harvard  apparently  have  of  theirs. 
It  was  the  young  women  who  were  watched  over,  and  watched 
mainly  by  the  anxious  Boards  of  their  own  Halls.  To  the 
Laboratories  in  the  Oxford  Museum  they  have  gone  unat- 
tended. This  indulgence,  I  conjecture,  was  granted  because 
no  chaperon  could  be  found  for  love  or  any  reasonable  sum  of 
money,  who  would  sit  patiently  in  unbroken  silence  for  three  or 
four  hours  together  by  the  side  of  a  young  enthusiast,  while 
under  a  microscope  she  examined  the  leg  of  a  frog.  In  the 
last  two  years  there  has  been  a  relaxation  in  these  rules,  at  all 
events  in  one  of  the  Halls.  Two  girls  or  more  can  now  attend 
a  lecture  without  a  chaperon.  It  is  only  for  solitary  students 
that  a  companion  must  be  provided.  The  need  of  such  com- 
panionship is  far  greater  in  Oxford  where  the  lecture-room  often 
opens  out  of  the  same  staircase  as  the  rooms  of  undergraduates. 
In  University  College,  London,  the  girls  go  unchaperoned  to  the 


278  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

ordinary  classes.  Three  years  ago  I  attended  a  few  of  the 
lectures  in  the  University  of  Geneva,  and  found  the  young  men 
and  women  studying  together  and  sitting  on  the  same  benches. 
I  did  not  notice  the  slightest  indication  of  giddiness  on  the  part 
of  a  single  student.  What  is  refused  at  Harvard  with  one  hand 
is  often  given  with  the  other.  To  the  College  Library  the 
women  have  no  admittance ;  nevertheless,  they  have  brought 
to  the  Annex  any  book  which  they  may  need.  From  the  work 
of  the  Graduate  School  they  are  too  much  cut  off;  in  some 
departments,  however,  provision  has  been  made  for  them. 
"  The  attitude  of  the  students  of  Harvard  College  towards  the 
Annex  students,  and  of  the  latter  towards  the  former,  appears," 
we  are  told,  "  to  be  that  of  unconcern."  Whatever  unconcern 
there  may  be  in  the  attitude  of  the  young  people,  and  however 
admirable  this  unconcern  may  be,  I  trust  that  the  unconcern  o£ 
the  Overseers  and  Corporation  and  of  every  member  of  the 
Faculty  will  before  long  entirely  disappear,  and  that  ^the  whole 
of  the  noble  foundation  will  be  thrown  open  to  men  and  women 
alike.  Above  all,  may  the  women  be  admitted  to  the  Medical 
School,  from  which,  by  an  il liberality  unworthy  of  the  age,  they 
seem  to  be  entirely  shut  out ! 

A  great  advance  has  this  year  been  made  —  an  advance 
which  before  long  must  sweep  away  all  these  idle  distinctions. 
Hitherto  the  Annex  has  in  no  way  been  officially  recognized  by 
the  University.  No  mention  of  it  is  made  in  the  Catalogue ; 
none  even  in  those  two  pamphlets  on  life  at  Harvard  by  the 
late  Secretary  to  the  University,  from  which  I  have  frequently 
quoted.  The  President  and  the  Deans  of  the  Faculties  know 
nothing  of  it  in  their  Reports.  The  good  they  do,  they  do  by 
stealth  and  blush  to  have  it  fame.  Henceforth  the  Annex  is 
openly  and  avowedly  to  be  attached  to  the  University,  though 


xvi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  279 

by  a  bond  somewhat  loose  in  appearance,  but  which  will  most 
certainly  gradually  tighten  and  be  made  indissoluble.  It  will 
be  a  corporation  in  itself,  thus  holding  the  same  position  as  one 
of  our  Oxford  or  Cambridge  Colleges.  It  will  have  the  entire 
control  of  its  funds  and  of  the  discipline  of  its  students.  The 
instruction,  the  examinations,  and  the  conferring  of  degrees  will 
be  in  the  hands  of  the  President  and  Fellows  of  the  University. 
They  will  be  "  the  Visitors  of  the  Corporation.  No  instructor 
or  examiner  will  be  appointed,  employed,  or  retained  with- 
out their  approval."  The  diplomas  of  the  degrees  that  are 
conferred  will  be  the  diplomas  of  the  Corporation,  approved  of 
by  the  Corporation  of  Harvard,  countersigned  by  the  President 
with  the  seal  of  the  University  affixed.  It  is  not  avowedly  the 
University  degree  that  the  Corporation  and  Overseers  are  yet 
prepared  to  offer.  They  have  not  been  able  to  screw  their 
courage  up  to  that  point ;  but  they  are  much  more  than  half- 
way across  the  stream,  and  onwards  they  must  go.  There  is 
fear,  we  are  told,  that  the  full  Harvard  degree  would  attract  so 
large  a  number  of  women  that  the  new  College  would  be  over- 
whelmed. I  am  reminded  how  nearly  sixty  years  ago  our 
Postmaster- General  opposed  the  scheme  of  penny  postage  be- 
cause the  number  of  letters  would  be  so  large  that  the  walls 
of  the  Post-Office  would  burst.  The  letters,  he  seemed  to  think, 
should  be  kept  down  to  the  size  of  the  building,  and  not  the 
building  enlarged  to  the  number  of  the  letters.  In  the  present 
case  where  can  the  danger  lie?  These  young  women  whom 
the  fearful  eye  of  authority  sees  flocking  in  from  every  State  in 
the  Union  would  have  no  power  to  force  admittance.  A  moder- 
ate increase  in  the  difficulty  of  the  entrance  examination  would, 
as  effectually  even  as  a  pestilence,  thin  their  ranks.  No  more 
need  be  received  each  year  than  the  buildings  can  conveniently 


280  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

hold.  A  second  objection  is  raised  that  "to  make  anything 
like  an  impartial  sharing  of  the  resources  of  the  University 
would  cripple  the  present  work  for  men."  The  mere  act  of 
conferring  the  full  Harvard  degree  would  not  cripple  the 
resources,  neither  would  they  be  crippled  if  the  women  were 
to  attend  the  lectures.  Whenever  there  is  not  room  for  them, 
in  those  few  cases  the  lecture  would  have  to  be  repeated,  as 
indeed  it  is  repeated  for  them  now.  Generally,  however,  they 
would  only  help  to  fill  empty  benches.  In  the  Laboratories 
there  might  be  greater  difficulties,  but  in  1892,  of  which  year  I 
have  the  Report  of  the  Society,  there  were  but  four  students  in 
Chemistry  and  three  in  Advanced  Zoology.  The  third  objec- 
tion has  far  more  force.  "  It  is  not  clear  that  the  opinion  of  the 
graduates  and  friends  of  the  University  is  yet  so  settled  as  to 
justify  this  departure  from  the  established  constitution  of  the 
University."  The  Corporation  and  the  Overseers  cannot  safely 
move  much  faster  than  is  approved  of  by  the  general  sense  of 
that  part  of  the  community  which  is  most  highly  educated.  If 
the  country  is  not  yet  ripe  for  the  change,  the  sure  course  of 
events  must  be  patiently  awaited.  At  the  same  time,  in  hasten- 
ing in  the  coming  of  this  good  time  the  University  should  take 
the  lead.  This  hitherto  she  has  not  done.  She  is  behind  many 
of  the  leading  American  Universities.  She  is  far  behind  almost 
all  the  countries  of  the  Old  World.  Even  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge, weighted  as  they  are  with  the  conservatism  of  six  centu- 
ries, have  outstripped  her.  Germany  alone  is  surpassed  by  her 
in  her  unwillingness  to  let  women  enjoy  the  same  opportunities 
as  men,  not  only  in  the  great  race  of  life,  but  in  the  far  nobler 
but  uncontentious  struggle  to  win  that  knowledge  and  those 
qualities  of  the  mind  which  give  life  its  fulness  and  perfection. 
Who  can  wonder  that  this  new  constitution,  when  it  was 


xvi.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  281 

promulgated,  met  with  strong  opposition?  All  those  who  will 
not  allow  that  half  a  loaf  is  better  than  no  bread,  were  in  arms. 
Petitions  were  presented  to  the  Legislature  of  the  Common- 
wealth of  Massachusetts  against  the  bill,  by  which  the  new 
powers  were  to  be  conferred.  In  the  State  House,  on  February 
28  of  this  year,  both  parties  appeared  before  the  Committee  on 
Education.  Happily,  in  the  interval,  much  had  been  done  by 
discussion  in  the  newspapers  to  show  that,  though  not  a  little 
was  left  to  do,  a  great  advance  had  been  made.  The  way  to 
conciliation  was  opened.  Some  concession  was  made,  and  the 
opposition  was  withdrawn.  Woman's  reason  triumphed  over 
woman's  rights;  with  time  the  rights  will  be  granted  to  the 
last  jot.  Let  those  who  are  still  doubtful  and  unsatisfied, 
take  courage  from  the  words  spoken  at  the  great  Harvard  Com- 
memoration, nearly  seven  years  ago,  by  a  graceful  writer,  the 
late  George  William  "Curtis  :  "Whoever  is  happy  enough  to  be 
here  to-day,  must  acknowledge  that  to  all  other  good  fortunes 
must  now  be  added,  not  only  the  felicity  of  coming  here  to 
salute  the  Mother  upon  her  two  hundred  and  fiftieth  anni- 
versary, but  of  finding  her  two  hundred  and  fifty  times  fairer 
and  stronger  and  more  beloved  than  ever  before.  Still  more, 
while  he  walks  about  this  Zion,  telling  her  towers,  marking  her 
bulwarks,  and  counting  her  palaces,  if  he  catches  a  glimpse  of 
the  modest  Annex,  he  is  still  happier  in  knowing  that  as  his 
ever-young  Mother  starts  to  complete  her  third  century,  the 
spell  of  old  tradition  which  commanded  her  to  bring  forth 
men-children  only,  is  broken  forever." l 

For  the  new  College  a  name  had  to  be  sought.  The  full 
title  was  far  too  long  and  the  Annex  was  without  dignity.  A 
friend  of  mine  overheard  an  argument  carried  on  in  a  train  by 

1  Harvard  University,  2$oth  Anniversary,  p.  309. 


282  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

two  girls  about  the  merits  of  Wellesley  College  and  the  Annex. 
Wellesley  College  stands  in  a  park  of  three  hundred  acres  on  the 
edge  of  a  small  lake.  When  it  was  opened,  its  generous  founder, 
Mr.  H.  F.  Durant,  a  New  England  lawyer,  said  that  his  three 
hundred  women  students  should  each  one  have  an  acre  of 
ground  to  herself  to  dance  on.  So  rapidly  has  the  College 
grown,  that  with  much  less  than  half  an  acre  they  would  now 
have  to  be  content.  With  all  its  great  superiority  of  grounds 
and  buildings,  it  is  at  present  behind  the  humble  Annex  in  the 
instruction  which  it  imparts.  Its  teachers,  with  scarcely  an 
exception,  are  women,  few  of  whom  can  have  had  the  full 
advantages  of  a  University  education,  while  the  students  at 
Cambridge  are  taught  by  a  body  of  University  Professors,  who, 
for  ability,  learning,  and  zeal,  are  unsurpassed  by  any  in 
America.  It  was  not,  however,  in  these  matters  that  the 
champion  of  Wellesley  in  the  train  tried  to  strike  the  balance. 
It  was  the  name  of  the  Annex,  that  by  its  lightness  turned  the 
scales  as  she  held  them  up.  She  was  not  going  to  be  "  Nico- 
demused  into  nothing."  She  thought,  no  doubt,  of  the 
Wellesley  "  Yell."  An  Annex  "  Yell  "  would  be  an  absurdity. 
It  would  die  away  in  the  throat  and  mock  the  young  enthusiast 
who  should  try  to  raise  it. 

Some  of  the  friends  of  the  infant  College  that  was  awaiting  its 
christening  would  have  called  it  Martha  Washington,  after  the 
great  Washington's  wife.  But  to  a  "  Yell,"  Martha  Washing- 
ton is  not  easily  harmonized.  Moreover,  the  very  name 
Martha  does  not  come  with  the  right  association  of  ideas.  It 
does  not  awaken  the  right  thoughts  and  recall  the  right 
memories.  It  raises  before  the  mind  the  picture  of  a  College 
of  Housewifery ;  it  tells  nothing  of  that  good  part  which  the 
real  student  chooses,  which  shall  never  be  taken  away.  What 


xvi.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  283 

had  Martha  Washington  to  do  with  learning  ?  Her  skill  in 
making  a  goose-pie  was,  I  dare  say,  as  indisputable  as  the  skill 
of  the  wife  of  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield ;  but  education,  like 
argument,  she  left  to  others.  While  all  the  "gossips"  were 
ransacking  their  heads  for  a  suitable  name,  it  fortunately  hap- 
pened that  an  antiquary,  Mr.  A.  M.  Davis,  in  his  researches 
into  the  beginnings  of  Harvard,  discovered  that  one  of  the 
earliest  benefactors  of  the  infant  College  was  Lady  Mowlson, 
the  widow  of  Sir  Thomas  Mowlson,  Lord  Mayor  of  London 
in  1634.  Her  maiden  name  was  Ann  Radcliffe.  About  the 
year  1 643,  "  out  of  Christian  desire  to  advance  good  learning, 
she  gave  one  hundred  pounds  to  be  improved  in  New  England, 
in  the  best  way  for  the  help  of  some  poor  scholar  or  scholars  in 
the  College,  and  to  be  settled  for  that  use." l  How  staunch  a 
Puritan  she  was,  is  shown  by  her  subscribing  in  May  of  the  fol- 
lowing year  no  less  than  six  hundred  pounds  towards  the  sum 
of  twenty  thousand  pounds  sent  to  the  Scottish  army  which 
had  marched  into  England  in  support  of  the  Parliamentary 
forces. 2  It  is  after  this  woman,  animated  as  she  was  by  a  love 
of  liberty  and  of  learning,  that  the  College  for  Women  is  to  be 
called.  Like  the  names  of  Harvard  and  Cambridge,  it  binds 
the  great  New  England  University  to  the  old  country  by  a 
fresh  link.  To  the  Oxonian  it  comes  with  a  peculiarly  pleasant 
sound,  recalling,  as  it  does,  his  own  Radcliffe  Library. 

Radcliffe  College  is  far  from  being  even  now  on  a  perfect 
equality  with  Harvard.  She  is  not  as  yet  one  of  the  members 
of  the  great  University.  She  no  longer  indeed  gathers  up  the 

1  Quoted  from  a  letter  by  the  Rev.  Thomas  Weld,  dated  Gates  Head, 
Jan.  2,  1649,  given  in  Ann  Radcliffe  —  Lady  Mowlson,  by  A.  M.  Davis. 
Reprinted  from  the  New  England  Magazine,  February,  1894,  p.  773. 

2  Ib.  p.  780. 


284  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  xvi. 

crumbs  that  are  thrown  to  her.  She  has  her  seat  at  the  well- 
furnished  table,  but  it  is  below  the  salt.  She  has  time  on  her 
side.  Her  full  day  will  come  when  she  is  ripe  for  it.  Mean- 
while she  must  turn  to  the  old  foundation,  as  Portia  turned  to 
her  Lord  Bassanio,  and  with  her  say  that  she 

"  Is  an  unlesson'd  girl,  unschool'd,  unpractis'd; 
Happy  in  this,  she  is  not  yet  so  old 
But  she  may  learn;  happier  than  this, 
She  is  not  bred  so  dull  but  she  can  learn; 
Happiest  of  all,  is  that  her  gentle  spirit 
Commits  itself  to  yours  to  be  directed, 
As  from  her  Lord,  her  Governor,  her  King." 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

The  Library.  —  Gifts  from  England.  — The  Fire  of  1764.  —Gore  Hall.  — 
The  Bequests  of  Prescott,  Sumner,  and  Carlyle.  — J.  L.  Sibley.  — Dr. 
Justin  Winsor. 

THE  Library  of  Harvard  College,  of  which  the  foundation 
had  been  laid  in  the  bequest  of  John  Harvard's  books, 
grew  slowly  but  steadily  during  the  seventeenth  century,  mainly 
by  gifts  from  England.  It  was  largely  increased  by  the  Tar- 
gums,  Talmuds,  and  Rabbins  of  Dr.  John  Lightfoot,  the  Orient- 
alist ;  of  whom  Gibbon  wrote  that  "  by  constant  reading  of  the 
Rabbies  he  was  almost  become  a  Rabbin  himself."1  It  was  more 
than  doubled  by  the  bequest  of  the  books  of  Dr.  Theophilus 
Gale.  On  April  4,  1689,  Samuel  Sewall,  when  on  a  visit  to 
Oxford,  recorded  in  his  Diary :  "  Was  shew'd  the  Library  and 
Chapel  of  Corpus  Christi  Colledge  and  the  Cellar  by  Mr.  Holland 
a  Fellow.  Library  may  be  ab*  the  bigness  of  Harvard.  .  .  . 
Said  Holland  treated  me  very  civilly  though  told  him  was  a 
N[ew]  E[ngland]  man."2  The  books,  whether  acquired  by 
gift  or  by  purchase,  were  of  a  solid  and  serious  kind.  They 
had  mostly  been  written  by  theologians  who,  like  Armado,  were 
"  for  whole  volumes  in  folio."  Among  the  donors  were  such 
men  as  the  Rev.  Mr.  Rogers,  the  founder  of  Rowley,  Massa- 
chusetts, who  in  his  last  will  professed  himself  "  to  have  lived 

1  The  Harvard  University  Library,  by  C.  K.  Bolton,  p.  435;  Gibbon's 
Misc.  Works,  ed.  1796,   II.  56. 

2  Sewall's  Diary,  I.  304,  307. 

285 


286  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

and  to  die  an  unfeigned  hater  of  all  the  base  opinions  of  the 
Anabaptists  and  Antinomians,  and  of  all  other  frantic  dotages 
of  the  times  that  spring  from  them."  In  the  same  solemn 
document  he  "  protested  against  the  general  disguisement  of 
long,  ruffian-like  hair."  l  The  age  of  the  Restoration  and  of 
Queen  Anne  came  and  went  by  without  affecting  the  Library. 
In  1723  "it  contained  no  volume  from  Addison,  or  his  fellows, 
nothing  of  Locke,  Dryden,  South,  or  Tillotson;  Shakespeare 
and  Milton  had  been  recently  acquired." 2  In  the  same  year 
Cotton  Mather  recorded  that  "  the  scholars'  studies  are  filled 
with  books  which  may  truly  be  called  Satan's  library."3  Per- 
haps among  them  were  some  of  Dryden's  Plays  and  Tillotson's 
Sermons,  —  equally  detestable  in  the  eyes  of  a  rigid  Puritan. 
Seventy  years  later,  when  Channing  entered  College,  "  the 
young  men,"  we  are  told,  "were  passionately  given  up  to  the 
study  of  Shakespeare."4  What  an  outcry  must  Mather  have 
raised  if  he  saw  the  letter  which  one  of  the  greatest  of  Har- 
vard's early  benefactors,  Thomas  Hollis,  sent  with  a  parcel  of 
books  from  England.  "  If,"  he  wrote,  "  there  happen  to  be 
some  books  not  quite  orthodox,  in  search  after  truth  with  an 
honest  design  don't  be  afraid  of  them.  A  public  library  ought 
^  to  be  furnished,  if  it  can,  with  con  as  well  as  pro,  that  students 
may  read,  try,  judge.  '  Thus  saith  Aristotle,'  '  Thus  saith  Cal- 
vin,' will  not  now  pass  for  proof  in  our  London  disputations."5 
Bishop  Berkeley  sent  books  —  Berkeley,  to  whom  belonged 
"  every  virtue  under  Heaven " ;  Bishop  Sherlock,  "  whose 
style,"  said  Johnson,  "  is  very  elegant,  though  he  has  not  made 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  426. 

2  The  Hamard  University  Library,  by  C.  K.  Bolton,  p.  436. 
8  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  341. 

4  Life  of  W.  E.  Channing,  I.  66. 

5  Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  433. 


xvii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  287 

it  his  principal  study,"  and  the  physician,  Dr.  Mead,  "who 
lived  more  in  the  broad  sunshine  of  life  than  almost  any  man." 
In  January,  1 764,  the  Library  was  destroyed  by  fire.  Dur- 
ing the  vacation  the  small-pox  had  broken  out  in  Boston,  and 
the  General  Court  of  the  Colony  had  fled  to  Cambridge,  just 
as  in  earlier  years  in  England  the  Parliament  had  fled  to  St. 
Albans  and  Oxford.  The  Governor  and  Council  met  in  the 
Library,  while  the  House  of  Representatives  sat  in  the  room 
beneath.  The  weather  was  very  cold,  and  too  large  a  fire,  it 
seems  likely,  was  kept  up.  "  In  the  middle  of  a  very  tem- 
pestuous night,"  writes  an  eye-witness,  "  a  severe  cold  storm  of 
snow,  attended  with  high  wind,  we  were  awaked  by  the  alarm 
of  fire.  Harvard  Hall,  the  only  one  of  our  ancient  buildings 
which  still  remained,  was  seen  in  flames.  In  a  very  short  time 
this  venerable  monument  of  the  piety  of  our  ancestors  was 
turned  into  a  heap  of  ruins."1  Of  five  thousand  volumes  only 
a  hundred  were  saved,  and  of  John  Harvard's  books  but  a 
single  one.  It  bears  the  title  of  The  Christian  Warfare 
against  the  Deuill,  World,  and  Flesh.  It  was  printed  in  Lon- 
don in  i634-2  There  was  grief  in  the  Colony  but  no  despair. 
Two  days  after  the  fire  the  House  of  Representatives  "  resolved 
unanimously  that  Harvard  Hall  be  built  at  the  expense  of  the 
Province,  and  granted  two  thousand  pounds  to  begin  the  new 
edifice."  Subscriptions  were  made  both  in  America  and  Eng- 
land. "The  Archbishops  of  Canterbury  and  York  subscribed 
and  used  their  influence  in  favour  of  the  College."  From  the 
King  and  Court  there  came  nothing.  Benjamin  Franklin  gave 
"  valuable  instruments  for  the  apparatus ;  also  a  bust  of  Lord 
Chatham " ;  Langhorne's  Plutarch  was  sent  by  Boswell's 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  112,  480. 

2  The  Harvard  University  Library,  pp.  433,  437. 


288  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

"  worthy  booksellers  and  friends,"  the  Messrs.  Dilly,  at  whose 
house  Johnson  "  owned  that  he  always  found  a  good  dinner." 
From  Barlow  Trecothick,  the  London  Alderman,  about  whom, 
despising  him  as  a  Whig,  he  asked,  "  where  did  he  learn  Eng- 
lish?" came  books  and  thirty  pounds  in  money.  Whitefield 
did  not  forget  the  day  when  he  had  preached  beneath  the  elm 
on  the  Common,  for  by  his  own  gifts  and  those  of  his  friends 
he  was  a  large  benefactor.  Dr.  Heberden  sent  three  guineas l 
—  Cowper's  "  virtuous  and  faithful  Heberden,"  "  ultimus 
Romanorum,  the  last  of  the  learned  physicians." 

The  Library  grew  rapidly,  and  by  1790  could  boast  of  twelve 
thousand  volumes.  During  the  Revolutionary  War,  by  a  gift  of 
the  Legislature,  it  had  received  four  hundred  volumes  confis- 
cated from  Tory  refugees.2  Most  of  these  unfortunate  men,  it 
is  to  be  hoped,  had  had  time  to  carry  off  their  books  with* 
them ;  otherwise  the  King's  friends  would  seem  to  have  been 
but  an  illiterate  set.  Eighty  years  after  the  great  fire,  in 
August,  1834,  an  alarm  was  raised  of  a  second  conflagration. 
A  Protestant  mob  had  burnt  down  a  Roman  Catholic  Chapel 
in  a  suburb  of  Boston ;  in  checking  their  lawlessness  the  Gov- 
ernment had  shown  almost  as  much  laxness  as  if  it  had  been 
an  Anti-Slavery  Hall  that  was  attacked.  Rumours  of  retaliation 
spread,  for  Papists  have  never  been  so  meek  under  wrong  as 
Abolitionists.  On  a  certain  night  a  bonfire,  it  was  said,  was  to 
be  made  of  the  Library  of  the  College.  A  body  of  students 
and  graduates  was  secretly  brought  together  to  defend  it.  "At 
dusk  sentinels  were  stationed  at  the  windows,  muskets  in  hand, 
ready  to  renew  the  sounds  of  war  which  had  not  been  heard 
within  its  peaceful  walls  since  the  days  of  1775.  They  sent 

1  Quincy's  Harvard,  II.  113,  491. 

2  Ib.  II.  399;   Higher  Education,  etc.,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  63. 


J 


u 

&  - 

8 


xvii.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  289 

out  a  waiter  to  reconnoitre  towards  Charlestown.  He  returned, 
saying  that  he  could  hear  nothing  but  frogs.  At  another  time 
a  horseman  came  at  full  speed  to  announce  that  one  thousand 
Irishmen  were  on  their  way  to  Cambridge." l  The  thousand 
Irishmen  were  as  insubstantial  as  the  four  hundred  Jesuits 
who,  at  the  time  of  the  Popish  Plot,  crossed  the  Straits  of 
Dover  on  dromedaries  and  exercised  every  night  on  Hamp- 
stead  Heath. 

The  bequest  of  one  hundred  thousand  dollars  (^20,450) 
made  to  his  old  College  by  an  eminent  Boston  lawyer,  Christo- 
pher Gore,  came  at  a  time  when  the  collection  of  books  had  out- 
grown the  building  in  which  it  was  lodged.  In  1838  the  foun- 
dation was  laid  of  Gore  Hall,  the  present  home  of  the  Library. 
Frequent  gifts  in  money,  books,  and  autographs  have  greatly 
enriched  it  of  late  years,  while  the  Corporation  of  the  Univer- 
sity has  given  it  the  most  liberal  support.  On  it  and  on  its 
branches  in  the  different  Schools  little  less  than  fifty  thousand 
dollars  (^10,225)  is  spent  every  year,2  two  thousand  pounds 
more  than  was  spent  on  the  Bodleian  in  i893.3  American 
scholars  have  not  been  unmindful  of  the  debt  they  owe  to  their 
Alma  Mater.  Prescott  bequeathed  to  the  Library  his  books 
and  manuscripts  relating  to  the  reign  of  Ferdinand  and 
Isabella.  Sumner  sent  it  more  than  fifteen  thousand  pam- 
phlets. "  He  used  to  say  that  he  preferred  having  them  at  the 
Library  rather  than  at  his  residence,  because  at  the  Library  he 
could  find  at  once  any  particular  pamphlet  he  wished  to  see." 

1  The  Harvard  University  Library,  by  C.  K.  Bolton,  p.  441. 

2  Higher  Education,  etc.,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  106. 

8  Under  the  Copyright  Act  the  Bodleian  can  claim  a  copy  of  every  new 
book  free  of  charge.  Nearly  forty  thousand  volumes  were  thus  received 
last  year. 

u 


290  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

On  his  death  he  left  it  many  rare  books;  among  them  an 
Album  in  which  Milton  had  inscribed  at  Geneva  :  — 

"  —  if  Vertue  feeble  were, 
Heaven  it  selfe  would  stoope  to  her. 

Coelum  non  animu  muto  du  trans  mare 
Curro 

Joannes  Miltonius 

Anglus 
Juny  10°  I639."1 

Lowell,  when  he  was  American  Minister  to  Spain,  wrote  from 
Madrid :  "  I  buy  books  mainly  with  a  view  to  the  College 
Library,  whither  they  will  go  when  I  am  in  Mount  Auburn, 
with  so  much  undone  that  I  might  have  done."  2 

Nay,  even  from  our  side  of  the  Atlantic  there  came  a 
scholarly  bequest.  Carlyle  left  it  a  part  of  his  "poor  and 
indeed  almost  pathetic  collection  of  books,"  to  quote  the 
words  of  his  will.  He  adds  :  — 

"  Having  with  good  reason,  ever  since  my  first  appearance  in  Literature, 
a  variety  of  kind  feelings,  obligations,  and  regards  towards  New  England, 
and  indeed  long  before  that  a  hearty  good  will,  real  and  steady,  which 
still  continues,  to  America  at  large,  and  recognizing  with  gratitude  how 
much  of  friendliness,  of  actually  credible  human  love,  I  have  had  from 
that  country,  and  what  immensities  of  worth  and  capability  I  believe  and 
partly  know  to  be  lodged,  especially  in  the  silent  classes  there,  I  have  now, 
after  due  consultation  as  to  the  feasibilities,  the  excusabilities  of  it,  decided 
to  fulfil  a  fond  notion  that  has  been  hovering  in  my  mind  these  many 
years;  and  I  do  therefore  hereby  bequeath  the  books  (whatever  of  them 
I  could  not  borrow,  but  had  to  buy  and  gather,  that  is,  in  general  whatever 
of  them  are  still  here)  which  I  used  in  writing  on  Cromwell  and  Friedrich 
and  which  shall  be  accurately  searched  for,  and  parted  from  my  other  books, 
to  the  President  and  Fellows  of  Harvard  College,  City  of  Cambridge,  State 
of  Massachusetts,  as  a  poor  testimony  of  my  respect  for  that  Alma  Mater  of 
so  many  of  my  transatlantic  friends,  and  a  token  of  the  feelings  above  indi- 
cated towards  the  Great  Country  of  which  Harvard  is  the  Chief  School." 

1  The  Harvard  University  Library,  by  C.  K.  Bolton,  pp.  441-43. 

2  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  II.  242. 


xvii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  291 

As  a  marginal  note  "  to  Walker's  Anarchia  anglicana  (Vol. 
II.  p.  139),  where  mention  is  made  of  the  Eikon  basilike  of 
Charles  L,  Carlyle  has  written  in  pencil :  '  Shewing  him  (had 
it  been  he,  which  palpably  it  was  not)  to  have  been  the  most 
perfect  Pharisee,  inane  Canter,  and  shovel-hatted  Quack  that 
ever  went  about  in  clear-starched  surplice  and  formula  ! — Do 
but  read  it.'"1 

One  remarkable  gift  has  lately  been  made  by  Longfellow's 
heirs  —  five  hundred  and  eighty-six  volumes  of  American 
Poetry,  mainly  presentation  copies.2  Who  is  so  hard-hearted 
as  not  to  be  touched  with  pity  when  he  reflects  on  the  five 
hundred  and  odd  letters  which  the  unhappy  recipient  had  to 
write  in  acknowledgment  of  these  cruel  presents  from  his 
brother  bards?  Compared  with  such  toil  as  this  the  Village 
Blacksmith's  was  a  mere  trifle. 

Mr.  J.  L.  Sibley,  who  was  Librarian  from  1856  to  1877,  by 
his  constant  importunities,  added  greatly  to  the  collection 
which  he  loved  so  well.  "  He  begged  from  his  friends  the  old 
books  and  pamphlets  which  lay  unused  in  their  garrets.  At 
last,  he  says,  '  I  acquired  the  name  of  being  a  sturdy  beggar, 
and  received  a  gentle  hint  from  the  College  Treasurer  to  desist 
from  begging,  which  I  as  gently  disregarded.'  "3  Some  twenty 
years  ago  he  published  a  book  entitled  Harvard  Graduates. 
His  researches  ended  with  the  men  who  took  their  degrees  in 
1689.  "There  are,"  wrote  Lowell,  "ninety-seven  of  them  by 
tale,  and  as  he  fishes  them  out  of  those  dismal  oubliettes  they 
come  up  dripping  with  the  ooze  of  Lethe,  like  Curll  from  his 
dive  in  the  Thames,  like  him  also  gallant  competitors  for  the 

1  Bibliographical  Contributions,  ed.  Justin  Winsor,  No.  26,  p.  6. 

2  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  174. 

8  The  Harvard  University  Library,  p.  443. 


292  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

crown  of  Dulness.1  It  is  the  very  balm  of  authorship.  No 
matter  how  far  you  may  be  gone  under,  if  you  are  a  graduate 
of  Harvard  College  you  are  sure  of  being  dredged  up  again 
and  handsomely  buried,  with  a  catalogue  of  your  works  to  keep 
you  down.  I  do  not  know  when  the  provincialism  of  New 
England  has  been  thrust  upon  me  with  so  ineradicable  a  barb. 
Not  one  of  their  works  which  stands  in  any  appreciable  rela- 
tion with  the  controlling  currents  of  human  thought  or  history, 
not  one  of  them  that  has  now  the  smallest  interest  for  any  liv- 
ing soul !  And  yet,  somehow,  I  make  myself  a  picture  of  the 
past  out  of  this  arid  waste,  just  as  the  mirage  rises  out  of  the 
dry  desert.  Dear  old  Sibley  !  I  would  read  even  a  sermon  of 
his  writing,  so  really  noble  and  beautiful  is  the  soul  under  that 
commonplace  hull ! " 2  In  his  last  Report  the  old  Librarian 
wrote  :  "  The  Library  has  been  during  more  than  half  of  a 
long  life  the  chief  object  of  my  interest,  and  I  have  given  to  it 
the  best  of  my  ability  and  attainments,  and  now  my  eyes  have 
become  so  dimmed  that  I  am  unable  to  read  this  Report."3 

Under  this  good  old  scholar's  successor,  Dr.  Justin  Winsor, 
the  Library  has  grown  with  extraordinary  rapidity.  In  the  last 
fourteen  years  the  number  of  books  has  increased  by  one 
hundred  and  fifty-nine  thousand,  and  of  pamphlets  by  one 
hundred  and  eleven  thousand.4  He  is  a  born  Librarian.  To 
extensive  learning,  a  love  of  books,  and  the  scholar's  kindly 
gentle  nature,  he  adds  common  sense  and  enthusiasm  —  a  rare 
combination  —  and  great  powers  of  organization.  "  I  try 
never  to  forget,"  he  wrote,  "  that  the  prime  purpose  of  a  book 

1  Lowell  quoted  from  memory.     It  was  into  Reet  Ditch  that  the  dives 
were  made,  and  Curll  was  not  one  of  the  divers. 

2  Letters  of  J.  R.  L<rwell,  II.  147. 

8  The  Harvard  University  Library,  p.  443. 
*  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  12. 


xvii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  293 

is  to  be  much  read ;  though  it  is  equally  true  that  we  are  under 
obligations  to  posterity  to  preserve  books  whose  loss  might  be 
irrecoverable."  1  In  this  view  of  the  Librarian's  duties  he  has 
the  President  on  his  side,  who  says  in  his  last  report :  "  How- 
ever troublesome  and  costly  it  may  be  to  teach  thousands  of 
students  the  abundant  use  of  books,  it  is  the  most  important 
lesson  that  can  be  given  them  during  their  student  life."2  In 
the  Harvard  Statutes  it  is  written :  "  The  Library  is  for  the 
use  of  the  whole  University." 3  It  is  open  for  readers  even  on 
Sunday  afternoons  during  term-time.  On  only  six  week-days 
in  the  whole  year  is  it  closed  —  Christmas  Day  and  the  five 
great  holidays  of  the  Commonwealth,  the  Twenty-second  of 
February  (Washington's  Birthday),  Fast  Day  (no  longer  kept 
as  a  fast),  Memorial  Day  (the  Commemoration  of  the  soldiers 
who  fell  in  the  war  between  the  North  and  the  South),  the 
Fourth  of  July  (Declaration  of  Independence),  and  Thanks- 
giving Day  (the  general  thanksgiving  for  the  blessings  of  the 
year  at  the  end  of  November) .  "  Twenty  years  ago  only 
fifty-seven  per  cent  of  the  students  in  College  used  it,  now 
over  ninety  per  cent  of  the  upper  classmen  are  borrowers. 
The  elective  system  deserves  a  part  of  the  credit  for  this 
increased  use  of  original  authorities.  The  mere  note-taking 
or  text-book  studying  student  is  now  the  exception  where  he 
used  to  be  the  rule." 4  Undergraduates  not  only  are  allowed 
to  read  in  the  Library,  but  those  "  who  have  given  bonds  may 
take  out  books,  three  volumes  at  a  time,  and  may  keep  them 
one  month."5  To  outsiders  these  privileges  are  extended. 

1  The  Harvard  University  Library,  p.  446. 

2  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  36. 
8  Catalogue,  p.  33. 

4  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  87. 
6  Catalogue,  p.  483. 


294  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Last  year  nearly  two  thousand  five  hundred  persons  in  all  were 
registered  as  borrowers,  of  whom  three  hundred  and  sixty-two 
did  not  belong  to  the  University.1  "  Books  have  been  sent  to 
scholars  as  far  south  as  New  Orleans,  and  as  far  west  as 
Wisconsin  and  New  Mexico.  A  very  general  use  is  made  of 
the  Library  by  scholars  in  all  parts  of  New  England." 8  It  is 
surprising,  with  such  an  extensive  circulation  as  this,  how  small 
is  the  loss.  In  his  last  Report  the  Librarian  says  :  "  Of 
books  reported  missing  since  1883  there  are  still  four  hundred 
and  fifty-nine  unaccounted  for "  —  not  fifty  volumes  a  year. 
Almost  all  of  these  have  disappeared  from  the  shelves  contain- 
ing works  of  reference  and  certain  other  collections  to  which 
all  readers  have  free  access. 

While  the  Library  is  thus  turned  into  a  great  school  where 
the  young  student  is  taught  the  use  of  books,  learning  and< 
scholarship  are  well  cared  for.  From  Professor  Child  I  learnt 
of  the  readiness  of  the  University  to  provide  even  at  a  great 
cost  all  the  works  which  a  scholar  needs.  For  one  rare  book, 
which  he  himself  required  for  his  English  and  Scottish  Popular 
Ballads,  no  less  than  a  thousand  dollars  (^£204)  was  given. 
The  Professor  of  the  newly-founded  Chair  of  Economic  His- 
tory, visiting  England  before  he  entered  on  his  post,  was 
directed  to  order  for  the  Library  many  rare  and  costly  works 
and  documents  which  he  needed.  Every  quarter  the  Harvard 
University  Bulletin  is  issued  by  the  Librarian,  in  which  is  given 
a  classified  list  of  the  principal  accessions.  Under  his  direc- 
tion, moreover,  is  published  from  time  to  time  a  scholarly  series 
entitled  Bibliographical  Contributions.  Fifty  numbers  have 
been  already  issued,  among  them  Principal  Books  relating  to  the 

1  Reports,  1892-93,  p.  173. 

2  The  Harvard  University  Library,  p.  447. 


xvii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  295 

Life  and  Works  of  Michaelangelo,  with  Notes,  by  C.  E.  Norton ; 
The  Bibliography  of  Ptolemy's  Geography ',  by  Justin  Winsor ; 
The  Dante  Collections  in  the  Harvard  College  and  Boston 
Public  Libraries,  by  W.  C.  Lane ;  A  Bibliography  of  Persius, 
by  M.  H.  Morgan.  How  good  a  thing  it  would  be  if  at 
Oxford  some  of  the  money,  too  often  wasted  so  far  as  learning 
is  concerned  on  scholarships  and  prize  fellowships,  were  spent 
in  training  young  scholars  in  an  exact  knowledge  of  literature  ! 
What  excellent  work  might  be  done  by  them  in  the  Bodleian  in 
preparing,  under  the  guidance  of  learned  men,  a  series  of 
bibliographies  such  as  these ;  or  in  gathering  and  arranging 
material  for  the  use  of  the  editor  of  our  great  English  Dic- 
tionary ! 

In  the  course  of  fifty  years  the  collection  of  books  has  again 
outgrown  the  building  in  which  it  is  lodged,  in  spite  of  the 
addition  of  a  wing  and  of  the  creation  of  several  Departmental 
Libraries.  The  number  of  readers,  moreover,  has  so  largely 
increased,  that  sitting  room  can  scarcely  be  found  for  the 
undergraduates,  while  for  men  of  learning  a  quiet  place  of 
study  is  greatly  needed.  He  who  has  been  used  to  work  in 
one  of  the  alcoves  in  Bodley,  where  he  was  never  crowded  and 
where  his  tired  eyes  could  get  rested  as  they  looked  down  on 
the  pleasant  lawn  of  Exeter  College  far  below,  would  study 
with  reluctance  in  Gore  Hall.  However,  with  the  abundant 
liberty  which  is  given  to  a  scholar  of  borrowing  books,  almost  all 
the  learned  work  is  done  outside  the  building  in  private  houses. 
The  Librarian,  in  a  Report  written  in  November,  1892,  spoke 
strongly  of  the  need  of  enlargement.  "I  have  in  earlier 
Reports,"  he  said,  "  exhausted  the  language  of  warning  and 
anxiety  in  representing  the  totally  inadequate  accommodations 
for  books  and  readers  which  Gore  Hall  affords.  Each  twelve 


296  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  xvii. 

months  brings  us  nearer  to  a  chaotic  condition."1  These 
warnings,  I  conjecture,  were  addressed  not  to  the  Corporation, 
but  to  the  rich  citizens  of  the  Commonwealth  in  general.  It 
was  for  them  to  add  to  the  permanent  foundations  of  Harvard. 
The  warnings  this  time  did  not  fall  on  deaf  ears,  and  for  a  brief 
space  the  brightest  prospect  was  opened.  In  Frederick  Loth- 
rop  Ames,  one  of  the  Fellows  of  the  College,  the  generous 
benefactor  presented  himself.  Taking  into  his  counsels  the 
Librarian  and  an  architect,  he  planned  a  noble  addition  to  the 
building.  When  I  was  at  Harvard  Dr.  Winsor  was  full  of 
happiness  at  the  glorious  prospect  which  opened  before  him 
and  his  beloved  Library.  "  In  a  moment  it  was  night."  The 
warm  heart  was  chilled  and  the  generous  hand  closed  by  the 
sudden  stroke  of  death.  Out  of  the  ample  fortune  which  he 
left  may  his  heirs  soon  raise  to  him  that  monument  which,  had* 
his  life  been  lengthened  by  a  few  brief  months,  he  would  have 
raised  to  himself. 

1  Reports,  1891-92,  p.  161. 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 

The  Government  of  Harvard. — The  Charter. — The  Overseers.  —  The 
Corporation,  Church,  and  State.  —  The  Faculty.  —  The  President.  — The 
Professors.  —  Oxford  and  Harvard. 

"  r  I  ""HE  management  of  Harvard  College  is  in  the  hands  of 
-L  three  separate  bodies ;  the  first  of  these  being  the 
Faculty,  or  immediate  government,  having  the  entire  discipline 
of  the  students  in  its  hands ;  the  second  being  the  Corporation, 
having  the  management  of  the  funds  and  revenues  of  the  College, 
and  the  appointment  of  instructors,  with  other  duties  exercised 
under  the  supervision  of  the  third  body,  the  Overseers,  repre- 
senting the  interests  of  the  graduates  and  of  the  public  at  large." l 
Of  these  three  bodies  the  oldest  is  the  Board  of  Overseers  and 
the  youngest  the  Faculty.  The  President  of  the  College  is  fx 
officio  an  Overseer,  and  President  of  the  Corporation  and  of 
the  Faculty.  It  was  in  1642,  six  years  after  the  resolution  was 
passed  to  found  the  College,  that  the  General  Court  of  the 
Colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay  placed  its  government  under  a 
Board  composed  of  "  the  Governor  and  Deputy-Governor,  and 
all  the  magistrates  of  this  jurisdiction,  together  with  the  teach- 
ing elders  of  the  six  next  adjoining  towns."  These  towns  were 
Boston  and  four  places  which  are  now  reckoned  as  its  suburbs, 
together  with  Cambridge.  The  "teaching  elders"  were  the 
ministers  of  the  Church.  To  them  was  given  the  entire  control 
of  the  College  property  and  full  powers  "  to  establish  all  such 

1  Life  of  George  Ticknor,  I.  355. 
297 


298  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

orders,  statutes,  and  constitutions  "  as  should  promote  "  piety, 
morality,  and  learning." 

This  Body  must  have  been  found  too  large  and  too  much 
scattered  "  to  have  the  immediate  direction  of  the  College,"  for 
in  1650  the  General  Court  by  a  Charter  "  enacted  that  the 
College  shall  be  a  Corporation  consisting  of  a  President,  five 
Fellows,  and  a  Treasurer  or  Bursar,  who  shall  have  perpetual 
succession,  and  shall  be  called  by  the  name  of  President  and 
Fellows  of  Harvard  College."  In  this  they  followed  the  model 
of  an  English  College,  where,  whenever  a  Fellowship  becomes 
vacant,  it  is  filled  up  by  the  votes  of  the  surviving  members  of 
the  Corporate  Body,  and  where,  with  very  few  exceptions,  the 
President,  under  whatever  title  he  is  known,  is  elected  by  the 
Fellows.  The  Harvard  President  and  Fellows  have  never  had  ^ 
that  freehold  right  in  their  posts  which  was  enjoyed  by  their 
brethren  in  England ;  neither  had  they  the  absolute  power  of 
appointment,  for  they  had  in  each  case  "  to  procure  the  presence 
of  the  Overseers  and  by  their  counsel  and  consent  to  elect." 
They  were  entitled  to  appoint  and  dismiss  the  officers  and 
servants  of  the  College,  and  to  make  orders  and  by-laws,  pro- 
vided the  said  orders  and  by-laws  were  allowed  by  the  Overseers. 
By  an  Appendix  to  the  Charter  in  1657  their  powers  were  in- 
creased. The  orders  and  by-laws  which  they  should  henceforth 
make  were  at  once  to  come  into  effect,  though  they  "were 
alterable  by  the  Overseers." 

"The  Charter  of  Harvard  College,"  said  President  Eliot  at 
the  Commemoration  of  1886,  "  granted  in  1650  is  in  force  to- 
day in  every  line,  having  survived  in  perfect  integrity  the  pro- 
digious political,  social,  and  commercial  changes  of  more  than 
two  centuries." 1  It  is  preserved  in  the  Library  of  the  College 

1  Harvard  University,  s^oth  Anniversary,  p.  262. 


xvin.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  299 

—  surely  one  of  the  most  venerable  of  documents  on  the  face 
of  the  earth ;  for  it  is  the  Charter  of  the  first  University  founded 
by  the  money  of  the  people  voted  in  their  popular  Assembly. 

The  first  President  was  Henry  Dunster,  a  graduate  of  Mag- 
dalen College,  Cambridge,  and  a  clergyman  of  the  Church  of 
England,  "  one  of  the  greatest  masters  of  the  Oriental  languages 
that  hath  been  known  in  these  ends  of  the  earth."  Of  the  five 
Fellows  two  were  Masters  of  Arts  and  three  Bachelors.  Their 
Christian  names  —  there  were  three  Samuels,  one  Jonathan,  and 
one  Comfort  —  seem  to  indicate  that  they  were  Puritans,  not 
only  by  conviction  but  by  birth. 

No  important  change  was  made  in  the  government  of  the 
University  till  the  Rebellion  of  the  Colonies.  In  1780,  four 
years  after  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  by  the  Constitu- 
tion which  was  framed  by  the  new  Commonwealth  of  Massa- 
chusetts, the  Governor,  Lieutenant-Governor,  Council  and 
Senate  of  the  Commonwealth  were  made  successors  to  the 
Governor,  Deputy-Governor,  and  Magistrates  on  the  Board  of 
Overseers,  the  President  and  the  ministers  of  the  six  churches 
still  retaining  their  seats.  By  an  Act  passed  in  1810  and  modi- 
fied in  1814  there  were  added  to  the  Board  fifteen  laymen; 
while,  instead  of  six  ministers  there  were  to  be  fifteen,  no  longer 
confined  to  particular  parishes,  but  chosen  from  among  the 
Congregational  churches  of  the  district  generally.  Both  laymen 
and  ministers  were  elected  by  the  Overseers.  In  1843  the 
clerical  seats  were  thrown  open  to  ministers  of  all  denomina- 
tions. By  the  Act  of  1 85 1  the  Senators  ceased  to  be  ex  officio 
members  of  the  Board,  and  seats  were  no  longer  reserved  for 
the  clergy.  Thirty  members  were  to  be  elected  by  the  Senators 
and  Representatives  assembled  in  one  room.  They  were  divided 
into  three  classes,  one  of  which  was  to  go  out  of  office  every 


300  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

year.  Party  politics  soon  cast  a  taint  over  the  election  and 
through  it  over  the  University.  In  1865  a  great  measure  of 
reform  was  carried.  Henceforth  the  President  and  Treasurer 
were  to  be  the  sole  ex  officio  members,  while  the  thirty  Over- 
seers were  no  longer  to  be  elected  by  the  Legislature  but  by  the 
Bachelors  of  Arts  of  five  years  standing,  the  Masters  of  Arts,  and 
the  holders  of  honorary  degrees.  By  a  provision  in  the  Act, 
the  wisdom  of  which  seems  more  than  doubtful,  "  no  officer  of 
government  or  instruction  in  the  College  is  entitled  to  vote." 
The  men,  that  is  to  say,  who  have  the  interests  of  the  Univer- 
sity most  at  heart,  and  who  know  best  how  to  promote  them, 
have  no  voice  in  the  election  of  this  important  Board.  The 
poll  is  taken  at  Cambridge  on  Commencement  Day.  Every 
voter  must  attend  in  person ;  there  is  no  voting  by  proxy  papers, 
as  in  the  election  of  Members  of  Parliament  in  our  Universities.1 
The  thirty  Overseers  are  divided  into  six  equal  classes,  one  of 
which  goes  out  of  office  every  year.  By  a  final  reform  carried 
in  1880,  "persons  not  inhabitants  of  the  Commonwealth  of 
Massachusetts  were  made  eligible."  In  the  present  year  six 
Overseers  are  citizens  of  outside  States.  Thus  in  the  course  of 
two  centuries  and  a  half  the  fetters  of  Church  and  State  have 
been  first  gradually  loosened  and  at  last  wholly  cast  away.  Not 
a  single  member  of  the  Corporation  or  of  the  Board  of  Over- 
seers holds  a  theological  degree.  "  A  few  years  ago  five  of  the 
Overseers  were  clergymen ;  of  these,  three  were  Unitarians,  one 
Episcopalian,  and  one  Orthodox  Congregationalist." 2  At  the 

1  The  Universities  of  England,  Scotland,  and  Ireland  return  nine  repre- 
sentatives to  Parliament,  who,  as  might  be  expected  from  the  nature  of 
Universities,  all  vote  with  the  Tory  party. 

2  History  of  Higher  Education,  etc.,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  92.     Bishop 
Lawrence,  as  I  am  informed  while  I  am  correcting  the  proofs,  was  elected 
to  the  Board  of  Overseers  last  Commencement  (1894). 


xvin.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  301 

present  time  fifteen  are  graduates  in  Arts,  twelve  in  Law,  and 
three  in  Medicine.1  The  President  is  a  layman,  and  on  the 
Corporation  not  a  single  minister  has  a  seat.  In  both  lists  are 
conspicuous  the  names  of  the  great  New  England  families. 
There  is  an  Endicott  to  take  us  back  to  the  very  foundation  of 
the  College,  to  the  days  of  the  first  Governor  of  the  Colony, 
that  stern  Puritan  who  cut  the  red  cross  of  St.  George  out  of 
the  royal  colours ;  and  a  Saltonstall  whose  two  ancestors,  Sir 
Richard  Saltonstall  and  his  son,  in  the  beginning  of  the  Com- 
monwealth stood  boldly  for  civil  and  religious  liberty.  In  John 
Quincy  Adams  and  Charles  Francis  Adams  we  have  brought 
back  to  our  memory  the  second  and  sixth  Presidents  of  the 
United  States,  and  the  accomplished  Minister  to  England  dur- 
ing the  War  between  the  North  and  the  South.  In  Samuel 
Hoar  we  have  the  representative  of  "  that  true  New  England 
Roman,"  of  whom  Emerson  so  finely  said  :  — 

"  With  beams  December  planets  dart 

His  cold  eye  truth  and  conduct  scanned; 
July  was  in  his  sunny  heart, 
October  in  his  liberal  hand."  2 

In  Bancroft  the  name  of  the  historian  and  in  Peabody  the 
name  of  the  philanthropist  live  again.  There  is  one  man  who 
figures  strangely  on  this  list.  Among  the  descendants  of  the 
men  who  crossed  the  seas  to  escape  the  tyranny  of  the  Stuarts 
is  found  a  Bonaparte  ! 3 

The  Overseers  appoint  forty  committees,  formed  partly  from 
their  own  body,  partly  from  outsiders.  Of  some  of  these  Com- 

1  Eight  of  the  twelve  who  have  degrees  in  Law  and  the  three  who  have 
degrees  in  Medicine  graduated  also  in  Arts. 

2  R.  W.  Emerson,  by  O.  W.  Holmes,  p.  214. 
8  He  is  a  grand-nephew  of  the  first  Napoleon. 


302  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

mittees  the  duties  are  "  to  visit  "  the  different  Departments  of 
the  University ;  others  report  on  the  Courses  of  Instruction. 
I  cannot  learn  that  these  "visitations  "  ever  take  place.  There 
is  a  tradition,  I  am  told,  that  an  Overseer  could  now  and  then 
drop  in  at  a  lecture,  but  at  the  present  day  the  professional 
mind  is  never  thus  rudely  agitated.  The  Board  has  five  "stated 
meetings"  every  year,  besides  one  "annual  meeting."  The 
Corporation  meets  on  the  second  and  on  the  last  Monday  of 
every  month. 

The  Fellows,  even  in  the  early  days  of  Harvard,  were  not 
necessarily  tutors,  neither  were  the  tutors  necessarily  Fellows ; 
in  this  respect  also  the  founders  had  modelled  their  institution 
on  the  English  Colleges.  It  rarely  happened  indeed  in  the 
American  Cambridge  that  the  majority  of  the  Fellows  were 
engaged  in  tuition.  Whether  they  were  at  first  required  to  be 
resident  is  not  clear.  At  all  events,  before  the  end  of  the 
seventeenth  century  the  obligation  had  ceased.  Thus  there 
shortly  grew  up  side  by  side  two  rival  authorities,  the  Corpora- 
tion and  the  tutors.  The  President  presided  over  both  bodies, 
siding,  it  would  seem  probable,  sometimes  with  one  and  some- 
times with  the  other.  "Not  until  after  1725  did  the  President 
and  tutors  assume  the  authority  of  an  independent  Board  on  all 
subjects  of  discipline."  Even  so  late  as  1785  "the  Professors 
were  required  to  exhibit  to  the  Corporation  the  text-books  used 
in  the  College  and  give  an  account  of  their  method  of  instruc- 
tion." At  the  beginning  of  the  present  century  on  the  Cor- 
poration for  the  first  time  there  was  not  a  single  resident 
Fellow.  In  1824  eleven  of  the  tutors,  in  a  memorial,  main- 
tained that  by  the  Charter,  "  the  Fellows  are  necessarily  resi- 
dent instructors."  Their  claim  was  not  allowed  by  either  the 
Corporation  or  the  Overseers;  but  to  meet  the  difficulties 


xviii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  303 

which  had  arisen,  "  the  immediate  government "  was  authorized 
to  assume  the  name  of  the  Faculty  of  the  University.1  The 
powers  which  they  had  gradually  acquired  they  not  only 
retained  but  extended.  By  the  increase  in  their  number  and 
in  their  dignity  through  the  rapid  foundation  of  Professorships 
in  the  early  part  of  this  century,  they  had  become  too  strong  a 
body  to  be  slighted.  At  the  present  time  there  are  six  Facul- 
ties over  the  eight  Schools  which  constitute  the  University; 
the  College  proper,  the  Scientific  School,  and  the  Graduate 
School  being  all  placed  under  the  Faculty  of  Arts  and  Sciences. 
"Each  Faculty  is  composed  of  all  the  Professors,  Assistant- 
Professors,  and  Tutors,  and  of  all  the  Instructors  appointed  for 
a  term  longer  than  one  year,  who  teach  in  the  department  or 
departments  under  the  charge  of  that  Faculty."  It  has  full 
power  of  discipline,  and  by  a  vote  of  two-thirds  of  its  mem- 
bers can  punish  a  student  not  only  with  rustication  but  with 
expulsion.  The  President  is  a  member  of  each  Faculty,  but 
its  chief  executive  officer  is  its  Dean,  "  who  is  -appointed  by 
the  Corporation,  with  the  consent  of  the  Overseers.  He  is 
responsible  for  the  proper  preparation  and  conduct  of  its 
business,  and  makes  an  annual  Report  to  the  President." 
These  Reports  are  published  every  year,  together  with  one 
by  the  President,  in  which  he  deals  with  the  information  and 
recommendations  contained  in  them  and  with  the  general  con- 
dition of  the  University.  "  Each  Faculty  may  delegate  any  of 
its  powers  relating  to  ordinary  matters  of  administration  and 
discipline  to  Administrative  Boards,  nominated  from  among 
its  members  by  the  President,  and  appointed  by  the  Corpo- 
ration with  the  consent  of  the  Overseers."  Three  such  Boards 
have  been  established,  all  under  the  Faculty  of  Arts  and 

1  Higher  Education,  etc.,  pp.  42,  73,  89. 


304  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Sciences,  one  for  the  College,  the  second  for  the  Scientific 
School,  and  the  third  for  the  Graduate  School.  This  Faculty  is 
also  divided  into  twelve  Divisions  ;  and  of  these  Divisions  some 
are  sub-divided  into  Departments.  For  each  Division  and  for 
each  Department  there  is  a  separate  Committee.  Thus  the 
Division  of  Ancient  Languages,  of  which  the  Professor  of  Greek 
Literature  is  Chairman,  is  composed  of  the  Departments  of 
Indo- Iranian  Languages,  presided  over  by  the  Professor  of 
Sanskrit ;  and  of  the  Department  of  The  Classics  (Greek  and 
Latin),  presided  over  by  the  Professor  of  Latin.  "  Each  of 
these  Committees  practically  decides  all  questions  of  instruc- 
tion and  honours  in  its  province."  1  There  are,  moreover,  in 
the  same  Faculty  fourteen  Standing  Committees,  which  deal 
with  such  subjects  as  Admission  Examinations,  Admission  from 
other  Colleges,  and  Fellowships  and  other  Aids  for  Graduates. 
The  discipline  of  the  College  outside  the  Lecture  Rooms  is 
maintained  by  the  Parietal  Board,  composed  of  "  the  Proctors 
and  the  Officers  of  Instruction  who  reside  in  University  build- 
ings, or  in  buildings  to  which  the  superintendence  of  the  Uni- 
versity extends."  On  it  there  are  forty-six  members.  They 
are  under  the  direction  of  a  Regent,  "  a  University  officer  who 
exercises  a  general  supervision  over  the  conduct  and  welfare  of 
the  students."  "It  is  a  tradition  of  the  College  that  no  teacher 
is  commanded  to  do  anything ;  his  work  is  only  suggested  to 
him  by  his  superior  officers.  The  controlling  Boards,  the 
Faculties,  the  Corporation,  and  the  Board  of  Overseers  never 
assume  a  mandatory  relation  to  each  other,  or  to  the  individu- 
als who  compose  them."  2 

The  Governing  Bodies  of  all  the  Schools  are  united  in  a 

1  Catalogue,  pp.  31,60;  Educational  Review,  April,  1894,  p.  315. 

2  Catalogue,  pp.  32,  62;  Higher  Education,  etc.,  by  G.  G.  Bush,  p.  92. 


xviii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  305 

University  Council,  whose  function  is  "  to  consider  questions 
which  concern  more  than  one  Faculty  and  questions  of  Univer- 
sity policy." 

"In  all  Departments  of  the  University,  Professorships  are 
held  without  express  limitation  of  time.  All  officers  of  instruc- 
tion and  government  are  subject  to  removal  for  inadequate 
performance  of  duty,  or  for  misconduct."  It  seems  neverthe- 
less to  have  been  "generally  assumed  "  till  the  beginning  of  the 
present  year,  that  "  the  tenure  of  office  of  Professors  was  a 
life-tenure."  1  Happily,  the  course  recently  taken  by  the  Cor- 
poration in  requesting  the  resignation  of  two  Professors  has 
scattered  this  assumption  to  the  winds.  Our  great  Universities 
have  surely  suffered  enough  from  these  life-tenure  men  to  be 
a  warning  to  the  younger  countries.  At  Harvard,  so  long  as 
there  is  zealous  discharge  of  duty,  the  Professor's  tenure  is  as 
sure  as  any  tenure  can  be  in  this  world.  Should  there  be  a 
failure  through  old  age,  an  ample  pension  will  before  long,  it  is 
hoped,  be  provided.  "An  alumnus,"  said  the  President  at  the 
Commencement  Day  Dinner  in  June,  1889,  "has  recently 
offered  a  gift  of  peculiar  acceptability  of  two  hundred  thousand 
dollars  (^40,899)  towards  the  retiring  allowance  fund,  than 
which  no  other  purpose  could  be  happier."  2  "Assistant-Pro- 
fessorships are  held  for  five  years,  and  tutorships  for  not  more 
than  three  years.  At  the  end  of  the  term  of  an  Assistant- 
Professor  or  Tutor  his  connection  with  the  University  ceases, 
unless  he  be  reappointed.  Lecturers  are  appointed  for  not 

1  Catalogue,   p.   30;    Harvard   Graduate?   Magazine,   March,    1894, 

P-443- 

2  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  104.     Dr.  George  M.  Lane,  Pope  Professor 
of  Latin,  who  resigned  his  office  last  spring,  has  received  "  a  retiring  allow- 
ance  of  three  thousand  dollars  (^"613)  a  year."     Harvard  Graduate? 
Magazine,  March,  1894,  p.  530. 

X 


306  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

more  than  one  year.  Instructors  are  appointed  for  such  terms 
as  convenience  may  require."  There  is  great  merit  in  this 
system.  In  any  case  where  incompetency  is  shown,  far  less 
moral  courage  is  required  in  the  Governing  Body  to  let  an 
appointment  lapse  by  course  of  time  than  to  bring  it  to  an 
end  by  dismissal. 

"  A  visitor  from  Europe,"  writes  Mr.  Bryce,  "  is  struck  by 
the  prominence  of  the  President  in  an  American  University 
or  College,  and  the  almost  monarchical  position  which  he 
sometimes  occupies  towards  the  Professors  as  well  as  towards 
the  students.  Far  more  authority  seems  to  be  vested  in  him, 
far  more  to  turn  upon  his  individual  talents  and  character, 
than  in  the  Universities  of  Europe.  Neither  the  German  Pro- 
Rector,  nor  the  Vice-Chancellor  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge, 
nor  the  Principal  in  a  Scottish  University,  nor  the  Provost  of 
Trinity  College  in  Dublin,  nor  the  head  in  one  of  the  Colleges 
in  Oxford  or  Cambridge  is  anything  like  so  important  a  per- 
sonage in  respect  of  his  office,  whatever  influence  his  individ- 
ual gifts  may  give  him,  as  an  American  College  President.  In 
this,  as  in  not  a  few  other  respects,  America  is  less  republican 
than  England.  .  .  .  No  University  dignitaries  in  Great  Britain 
are  so  well  known  to  the  public,  or  have  their  opinions  quoted 
with  so  much  respect,  as  the  heads  of  the  seven  or  eight  lead- 
ing Universities  of  the  United  States."  1  Among  the  seven  or 
eight  heads  President  Eliot  undoubtedly  holds  the  first  place. 
He  holds  it,  not  only  as  the  President  of  the  first  University 
on  the  American  continent,  but  also  by  reason  of  his  own 
great  qualities.  He  is  a  born  ruler  of  men.  A  distinguished 
American  historian,  speaking  to  me  of  the  powers  which  he 
has  shown  during  his  five  and  twenty  years  of  office,  both  in 

1  The  American  Commonwealth,  2d  ed.,  II.  548-49. 


xvin.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  307 

governing  and  in  organizing,  said  :  "  He  would  have  made  an 
admirable  President  of  a  great  Railway  Company  or  of  the 
United  States."  Six  months  after  he  was  appointed  Lowell 
wrote  of  him  :  "  Our  new  President  of  the  College  is  winning 
praise  of  everybody,  I  take  the  inmost  satisfaction  in  him,  and 
think  him  just  the  best  man  that  could  have  been  chosen. 
We  have  a  real  Captain  at  last." l  His  father  for  eleven  years 
had  been  Treasurer  of  the  College.  His  grandfather  had 
founded  the  Chair  of  Greek  Literature.  His  uncle,  on  his 
mother's  side,  the  father  of  Professor  Charles  Eliot  Norton, 
that  graceful  and  accomplished  scholar,  the  editor  of  Lowell's 
Letters,  had  held  the  Chair  of  Sacred  Literature.  He  him- 
self graduated  at  Harvard,  and  was  for  some  time  Assist- 
ant-Professor of  Mathematics  and  Chemistry.  Later  on  he 
was  placed  at  the  head  of  the  Department  of  Chemistry  in 
the  Scientific  School.  Resigning  this  post,  ten  years  after 
graduation  he  went  to  Europe,  where  "  he  spent  two  years  in 
the  study  of  Chemistry,  and  in  acquainting  himself  with  the 
organization  of  public  institutions  in  France,  Germany,  and 
England."2  He  returned  to  America  to  fill  the  Chair  of 
Chemistry  in  the  Massachusetts  Institute  of  Technology.  Not 
having  yet  had  his  fill  of  learning,  he  once  more  returned  as  a 
student  to  Europe.  In  September,  1868,  the  President  of  Har- 
vard retired,  and  Mr.  Eliot,  who  was  in  his  thirty-fifth  year, 
was  appointed  his  successor  by  the  Corporation.  Among  the 
Fellows  there  was,  I  was  told,  one  man  of  great  insight  and 
great  influence,  who  had  discovered  the  young  Professor's 
extraordinary  powers,  and  who  convinced  his  colleagues  of  his 
pre-eminent  fitness  for  the  post.  The  Overseers  apparently 
wished  to  follow  in  the  old  course,  and  to  have  the  choice  fall 

l  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  II.  58.          2  Higher  Education,  etc.,  p.  220. 


308  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

on  some  elderly  man,  distinguished  rather  by  his  learning 
than  by  his  strength  of  character  and  all  the  high  and  rare 
qualities  of  a  ruler.  At  all  events  they  refused  their  "  consent." 
The  Corporation  elected  him  a  second  time,  and  a  second  time 
the  Overseers  vetoed  the  election.  After  an  interregnum  last- 
ing more  than  seven  months  they  at  last  yielded.  On  May  19, 
1869,  Mr.  Eliot  became  President  of  Harvard  College,  and 
the  College  was  at  once  launched  on  its  great  and  rapid  course 
of  the  most  glorious  prosperity. 

How  different  is  his  position  from  that  held  seventy  years 
ago  by  his  predecessor,  Dr.  Kirkland,  whose  office,  according 
to  Lowell,  "combined,  with  its  purely  scholastic  functions, 
those  of  accountant  and  chief  of  police  !  For  keeping  books 
he  was  incompetent  (unless  it  were  those  he  borrowed),  and 
the  only  discipline  he  exercised  was  by  the  unobtrusive  pres* 
sure  of  a  gentlemanliness  which  rendered  insubordination  to 
him  impossible."1  The  President  of  our  days  is  a  great 
power ;  he  surveys  the  whole  machine  of  the  rapidly  growing 
University,  and  adjusts  it  to  the  needs  and  changes  of  the 
times  and  to  the  advances  of  scholarship  and  science.  "  He 
has  to  preside  at  the  meetings  of  the  Corporation  and  to  act 
as  the  ordinary  medium  of  communication  between  the  Cor- 
poration and  the  Overseers,  and  between  the  Corporation  and 
the  Faculties.  He  has  to  make  an  annual  report  to  the  Over- 
seers on  the  general  condition  of  the  University.  He  has  to 
preside  on  public  academic  days ;  to  preside  over  the  several 
Faculties ;  to  direct  the  official  correspondence  of  the  Uni- 
versity ;  to  acquaint  himself  with  the  state,  interests,  and  wants 
of  the  whole  institution ;  and  to  exercise  a  general  superin- 
tendence over  all  its  concerns."2  How  admirably  President 

1  Literary  Essays,  1890,  I.  84.  2  Catalogue,  p.  29. 


xviir.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  309 

Eliot  has  done  his  work  is  shown  by  the  extraordinary  growth 
of  Harvard  in  the  last  twenty-five  years.  Part  of  this  growth 
is  due  to  that  great  reform  which,  three  years  before  he  entered 
on  office,  established  a  government  of  the  University,  by  the 
University,  for  the  University.  Part  is  due  to  the  sound 
scholars  and  ardent  workers  among  the  senior  Professors,  who, 
even  longer  than  he,  have  been  steadily  advancing  the  highest 
interests  of  Harvard.  Much  is  due  to  the  younger  men  whom 
he  helped  to  choose,  and  who  have  so  well  supported  him  in 
all  his  great  measures.  But  when  all  is  deducted  there  still 
remains  a  noble  balance.  Much  will  be  forgotten ;  but  in  far 
distant  years  Harvard  men  will  still  talk  of  the  Age  of  the 
Great  President.  In  the  quarter  of  a  century  in  which  he  has 
held  office,  the  number  of  students  under  the  Faculty  of  Arts 
and  Science  has  increased  from  six  hundred  and  thirty-four 
to  two  thousand  one  hundred  and  eighty-eight,  and  of  students 
in  the  whole  University  from  eleven  hundred  and  twelve  to 
three  thousand  one  hundred  and  fifty-six.1 

The  revenue,  which  at  the  beginning  of  the  period  was  two 
hundred  and  seventy  thousand  dollars  (,£55,213)  is  now  one 
million  and  forty-seven  thousand  (^2 14,108);  while  the  aid 
given  every  year  in  money  to  poor  students  has  grown  from 
twenty-five  thousand  dollars  (^5111)  to  eighty-nine  thousand 
(^18,199).  Twenty- four  new  buildings  have  been  erected 
at  a  cost  of  two  million  two  hundred  and  fourteen  thousand 
dollars  (^452,757),  and  as  I  am  writing  fresh  piles  are  rapidly 
rising.2  Romam  lateritiam  invenit,  marmoream  reliquit. 

1  I  do  not  include  the  three  hundred  and  forty-six  students  who  attend 
the  Summer  School  —  a  school  which  has  been  called  into  existence  in  this 
period. 

2  Harvard   University,   by    F.   Bolles,    pp.    12,    98-101;    Catakgw, 

P-  536. 


310  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

Such  a  constitution  as  this  where,  according  to  the  strict 
letter,  the  Overseers  in  so  many  matters  have  an  absolute  veto 
over  the  votes  of  the  Corporation,  where  the  Corporation  has 
an  unlimited  control  over  the  Faculty,  and  where  the  power  of 
the  President  is  so  small  would  seem  unworkable  in  a  great 
University.  Like  the  English  constitution,  it  moves  easily  by 
the  combined  forces  of  wise  custom  and  common  sense.  The 
Overseers,  who  are  the  stronghold  of  academic  conservatism, 
never  push  their  rights  to  the  point  of  obstinacy,  and  the  Cor- 
poration has  long  worked  in  harmony  with  the  Faculty.  It  is 
only  in  matters  of  general  policy  that  the  Overseers  make  their 
power  felt ;  and  even  in  these  they  never  long  oppose  the  Cor- 
poration and  a  united  Faculty.  When  the  Faculty  is  divided, 
then  they  have  been  known  to  side  with  the  minority.  A  few 
years  ago,  for  instance,  a  proposal  to  institute  a  "  Three  Years' 
Course,"  which  was  supported  by  a  considerable  majority  of 
the  Faculty,  was  vetoed  by  the  Overseers,  mainly,  I  believe, 
under  the  influence  of  a  few  of  the  ablest  Professors.  They 
have  been  described  at  Harvard  as  "our  House  of  Lords, 
whose  main  business  it  is  to  act  as  a  drag  on  progress."  They 
are  perhaps  chiefly  useful  as  a  means  of  getting  money.  They 
are  generally  chosen  from  among  the  most  influential  and 
wealthy  New  England  families.  Their  official  position  increases 
the  interest  in  the  University  which  they  would  naturally  feel  as 
graduates,  and  they  not  only  themselves  often  make  splendid 
donations,  but  they  stir  up  the  liberality  of  their  friends.  They 
everywhere  preach  the  gospel  of  endowment.  Though  the 
appointment  of  the  Professors  and  other  teachers  nominally 
belongs  to  the  Corporation,  under  the  approval  of  the  Over- 
seers, it  is  by  the  Faculty  in  each  branch  and  the  President 
acting  together  that  every  vacancy  is  rilled  up.  The  name  that 


xviii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  311 

he  in  concurrence  with  them  submits  to  the  Corporation,  and 
through  them  to  the  Overseers,  is  always  accepted.  No  better 
mode  of  appointment  could  be  devised.  With  the  men  most 
competent  to  judge  of  a  teacher's  merits  and  who  have  most  at 
heart  the  welfare  of  their  own  School,  acting  with  the  Presi- 
dent, the  choice  lies.  Jobbing  and  favouritism  seem  unknown. 
Not  a  breath  of  suspicion  ever  reached  me. 

By  the  side,  therefore,  of  the  two  powers  recognized  by  the 
Charter,  two  others  have  gradually  grown  into  great  importance 
—  the  President  and  the  Faculty.  The  President,  it  is  true, 
from  the  first  belonged  to  both  the  original  Governing  Bodies, 
being  a  member  of  the  Overseers  and  presiding  over  the  Cor- 
poration ;  but  he  has,  as  it  were,  two  persons,  one  in  which  he 
is  a  member  of  these  bodies,  and  one  in  which  he  is  an  inde- 
pendent power.  In  this  second  position  he  has  no  absolute 
authority,  but  he  rules  like  a  wise  constitutional  monarch  of  the 
earlier  type,  who,  keeping  within  the  lines  of  the  constitution, 
nevertheless  was  a  real  and  strong  governor.  In  every  measure 
theoretically  the  President  can  be  overruled  first  by  the  Corpo- 
ration and  next  by  the  Overseers,  but  practically  in  almost  every 
measure  connected  with  discipline  and  instruction  he  has  his 
own  way,  so  long  as  he  is  supported  by  the  Faculty.  If  he 
may  justly  be  compared  to  a  King  or  a  President  of  a  Republic, 
it  is  to  a  King  like  William  III.,  or  to  a  President  like  Lincoln, 
each  of  whom  was  his  own  Prime  Minister.  The  Faculty 
exists  by  the  vote  of  the  Corporation  and  the  Overseers,  and 
by  their  vote  could  theoretically  be  abolished.  Nevertheless, 
as  I  have  shown,  it  has  gained  a  position  of  great  authority 
and  stability.  With  the  management  of  the  property  of  the 
University,  the  Faculty  has  nothing  directly  to  do,  that  falling 
within  the  province  of  the  Corporation.  They  leave  it  mainly 


312  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

to  the  Treasurer,  who  by  virtue  of  his  office  is  a  member  of 
the  Board. 

In  nothing  does  Harvard  differ  more  thoroughly  from  Oxford 
than  in  the  perfect  organization  which  exists  in  her  army  of 
teachers.  In  Oxford  the  teachers  are  divided  into  two  main 
bodies,  entirely  independent  of  each  other  and  under  no  central 
government  —  the  University  Professors  and  the  College  Tutors. 
Over  the  Professors  scarcely  any  control  exists ;  they  rival  the 
Cyclopes  in  their  independence.  The  tutors  are  governed  each 
by  the  Corporation  of  his  own  College.  Of  this  Corporation  he 
is  commonly  a  member.  The  Colleges  are  twenty  in  number.1 
To  the  Professors  and  Tutors  must  be  added  the  University 
Readers,2  who  are  under  a  special  Board  ;  the  Assistants  and  the 
Demonstrators  in  the  Museum  who  are  under  the  control  of 
their  Professors ;  and  the  teachers  of  the  Unattached  Students 

—  the  students,  that  is  to  say,  who  are  undergraduates  of  the 
University,  but  are  not  members  of  any  College.     In  all  the 
confusion  of  such  a  system  as  this,  if  system  it  can  be  called, 
there  is  a  great  waste  of  labour  and  of  money,  and  an  unfair 
inequality  of  payment.     There  are,  or  there  have  been  till  lately, 
Professors  of  great  learning  who  have  lectured  to  empty  benches 

—  I  might  say  to  empty  chairs ;  for,  unable  to  face  the  forlorn 
look  of  the  lecture- rooms,  they  have  given  their  instruction  in 
their  own  studies.     Even  there  there  has  been  an  appearance 
of  vacancy.     On  the  other  hand,  there  are  Tutors  who,  never 
failing  to  draw  together  a  large  number  of  students,  are  never- 

1  I  exclude  Keble,  for  it  is  not  a  College  in  the  sense  in  which  the  word 
has  always  been  used  at  Oxford.     It  is  governed  by  a  Board  of  outsiders. 
Neither  do  I  reckon  the  two  Halls. 

2  They,  roughly  speaking,  answer  to  the  Assistant-Professors,  but  they 
are  independent  of  the  Professors.     In  some  departments  indeed  there  is 
only  a  Reader  and  no  Professor. 


xviii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  313 

theless  miserably  paid  for  their  work,  and  see  no  sure  opening 
before  them  of  advancement.  In  our  army  of  learning  there 
is  no  Field-Marshal's  baton  in  every  soldier's  knapsack. 
There  is  no  clear  and  well-marked  path  of  promotion,  on  which 
a  young  man  can  with  confidence  set  his  foot,  sure  that  high 
merit  will  in  time  bring  him  to  a  high  position.  However  able 
he  may  be,  he  has  chance  fighting  heavily  against  him.  The 
learned  author  who  is  at  present  throwing  a  stream  of  light  on 
the  reign  of  the  first  two  Stuarts  and  of  the  Commonwealth, 
skilled  though  he  is  as  a  teacher,  has  never  been  made  a  Tutor 
in  the  College,  or  a  Professor  in  the  University,  which  he  so 
greatly  adorns.  From  the  College  at  the  beginning  of  his  career 
he  was  shut  out  by  religious  intolerance,  just  as  from  the  same 
College  another  distinguished  student  and  teacher,  many  years 
later,  was  thrust  forth.  From  a  University  Chair  he  has  been 
excluded  mainly  through  the  absence  of  organization  in  the  staff 
of  teachers.  He  is  by  no  means  a  solitary  example.  Mr.  Free- 
man was  not  made  Professor  of  History  until  he  was  too  old  to 
learn  the  teacher's  art ;  Mr.  Froude,  when  he  succeeded  him, 
had  passed  the  Psalmist's  limit  of  three-score  years  and  ten. 
The  two  distinguished  scholars  who  have  recently  been  raised 
to  the  Chairs  of  Greek  and  Latin,  in  a  wealthy  and  properly 
organized  University  would  have  been  made  Professors  twenty 
years  earlier.  So  often  does  it  happen  in  Oxford  that  men  are 
not  promoted  till  they  are  past  their  prime,  that  not  uncommonly 
a  Professor's  salary  is  looked  upon,  not  as  wages,  but  a  reward. 
Little  surprise  is  caused  by  the  nomination  of  a  man  from  whom 
fresh  work  can  hardly  be  expected.  That  he  has  done  good 
work  is,  with  many,  a  full  justification  of  his  appointment.  It 
is  his  claims,  and  not  the  claims  of  the  students,  that  are 
examined.  His  well-earned  pension  as  a  hard  and  successful 


314  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

worker  in  the  field  of  learning  is  to  be  provided  at  their  expense. 
Through  the  whole  of  the  University  far  too  much  is  spent  in 
rewards  and  far  too  little  in  wages.  Were  the  wealth  of  the 
foundations  more  wisely  used,  teachers  would  be  more  fairly 
remunerated,  and  learned  men  and  students  of  nature,  who 
may  have  no  gift  for  teaching,  would  be  able  to  count  on  a 
decent  maintenance  whilst  they  laboriously  advanced  the  boun- 
daries of  knowledge.  In  Harvard,  provision  for  such  men  as 
these  is  as  yet  but  very  imperfectly  made.  The  millionaire 
who  shall  endow  research  has  not  as  yet  appeared  on  the  stage 
of  the  New  England  Cambridge.  Perhaps  he  is  within  the 
prompter's  call. 

It  is  in  the  organization  of  the  great  body  of  teachers  that 
Harvard  excels.  An  undergraduate  who  greatly  distinguishes 
himself,  after  taking  his  degree,  with  the  help  of  a  scholarship, 
if  he  is  a  poor  man,  will  continue  his  studies  in  the  Graduate 
School  or  in  some  foreign  university.  In  due  time  he  joins  the 
staff  of  teachers  as  a  Lecturer,  Demonstrator,  or  Assistant.  His 
appointment  is  but  for  one  year.  In  all  likelihood  it  will  be 
continued  if  he  shows  his  fitness  for  the  post.  If  he  does  not, 
he  is  weeded  out  while  he  is  still  young  enough  to  seek  his  living 
elsewhere.  The  University  is  not  saddled  with  an  incompetent 
teacher,  who,  as  sometimes  happens  in  our  Oxford  Colleges,  is 
kept  on  through  pity,  to  the  great  injury  of  the  students.  He, 
however,  who  successfully  passes  through  this  period  of  proba- 
tion may  hope  before  long  to  become  an  Instructor  or  a  Tutor 
with  a  longer  engagement ;  and,  later  on,  an  Assistant-Professor 
with  much  higher  pay  and  an  engagement  for  five  years.  At 
last  he  arrives  at  the  full  Professorship.  He  can  rise  no  higher, 
unless  he  is  made  President ;  but  with  length  of  service  and  with 
merit  his  salary  increases  up  to  a  certain  limit.  The  average 


xviii.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  315 

age  at  which  a  man  becomes  full  Professor  is  thirty-five  years. 
If  in  any  of  these  grades  of  advancement  there  is  no  vacancy 
in  Harvard,  an  able  teacher  may  count  on  receiving  a  "  call " 
from  some  other  University.  Should  he  there  greatly  distinguish 
himself,  he  is  scarcely  less  sure,  when  a  vacancy  does  occur,  to 
be  recalled  to  his  old  College.  The  chance  of  promotion  has 
greatly  increased  of  late-years,  not  only  by  the  foundation  of 
other  seats  of  learning,  for  each  of  which  a  whole  staff  of  Pro- 
fessors is  needed,  but  moreover  by  the  rapid  growth  in  all 
the  chief  departments  of  the  University.  This  has  indeed  gone 
on  by  leaps  and  by  bounds.  In  the  last  twenty-five  years  the 
number  of  students,  as  I  have  said,  has  increased  by  more  than 
two  thousand.  Instead  of  forty- eight  Professors  and  Assistant- 
Professors  there  are  now  one  hundred  and  eighteen,  and  instead 
of  thirty- three  Tutors,  Instructors,  Demonstrators,  and  Assistants 
there  are  now  two  hundred  and  four.  Twenty- five  years  ago 
there  were  in  all  eighty-one  teachers ;  they  now  number  three 
hundred  and  twenty-two.  This  augmentation  is  still  going  on. 
This  year  there  are  eighteen  more  Professors  and  Assistant- 
Professors  than  there  were  two  years  ago,  while  the  lower  ranks 
of  teachers  have  in  the  same  short  time  been  increased  by  fifty- 
one.1 

In  the  method  which  is  followed  when  a  vacant  Chair  has  to 
be  filled  up  or  a  new  Chair  is  created,  Harvard,  in  common,  I 
believe,  with  American  universities  in  general,  sets  us  an  excel- 
lent example.  No  application  is  made  for  the  post  by  a  crowd 
of  eager  candidates  ;  no  testimonials  are  sent  in  —  testimonials 
in  which  one  side  of  the  shield  only  is  shown,  in  which  truth  so 
often  is  divided  from  falsehood  by  the  thinnest  of  partitions. 

i  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  12;  Catalogue,  1891-92,  p.  454; 
Ib.  1893-94,  p.  536. 


316  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP.  xvm. 

The  members  of  each  Faculty  have  made  themselves  acquainted 
with  the  merits  of  the  most  eminent  teachers  in  other  seats  of 
learning;  should  Harvard  herself  not  furnish  the  right  man, 
they  know  where  he  is  to  be  found.  He  is  offered  the  post ; 
he  is  not  exposed  to  the  loss  of  dignity  which  invests  a  suitor. 
One  man  is  honoured  by  the  selection  which  is  made  of  him ; 
none  are  wounded  in  their  feelings  by  being  passed  over.  The 
selection  is  not  confined  to  citizens  of  the  United  States.  Two 
years  ago  two  new  Chairs  were  founded  at  Harvard,  one  of 
Economic  History,  the  other  of  Experimental  Psychology.  To 
fill  them  an  invitation  was  sent  across  the  Canadian  border  to 
an  Oxford  Master  of  Arts,  a  Professor  in  the  University  of 
Toronto,  and  across  the  Atlantic  to  a  German  Doctor  of  Phi- 
losophy, a  teacher  in  the  University  of  Freiburg. 

How  happy  would  a  University  be  where,  with  a  perfect  sys- 
tem of  subordination  by  which  merit  is  sure  of  recognition, 
should  be  combined  the  social  life  and  the  friendly  intercourse 
and  all  the  opportunities  for  the  interchange  of  thought  and 
knowledge  which  are  found  in  every  one  of  our  Oxford  Col- 
leges. Each  one  of  them  is  the  gathering-place,  the  home,  of 
a  small  knot  of  learned  men.  Each  of  the  Common-Rooms 
is  a  centre  of  kindly  feeling  and  hospitality.  Of  these  we  have 
twenty ;  Harvard  has  not  one.  It  will  be  easier  for  Oxford  to 
take  to  herself  all  the  good  that  there  is  in  the  Harvard  system, 
than  for  Harvard  to  add  to  her  vigorous  and  admirable  organi- 
zation all  that  charm  and  pleasantness  of  life  which  make  an 
Oxford  man's  College  scarcely  less  dear  to  him  than  Oxford 
herself.  By  an  Act  of  Parliament  the  one  reform  can  be 
in  great  part  effected;  the  other  could  only  come  about  by 
the  slow  changes  of  long  years. 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

Graduate  Schools  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  —  Respublica  Literatorum.  — 
American  Students  in  English  Universities. — The  Old  Home. 

THE  Senate  of  our  English  Cambridge,  I  read,  has  issued 
a  report  in  favour  of  graduate  study.  It  is  proposed 
"  to  establish  two  new  degrees,  those  of  Bachelor  of  Letters 
and  Bachelor  of  Science,  open  to  graduates  either  of  Cam- 
bridge or  of  other  *  recognized  '  universities,  who  shall  have 
given  evidence  that  they  have  pursued  at  Cambridge,  for  at 
least  one  year,  a  course  of  advanced  study  or  research,  and 
shall  also  have  presented  an  original  dissertation  for  approval 
by  the  board  of  studies."  I  hope  that  this  scheme  will  be  not 
only  adopted  but  greatly  enlarged,  and  that  in  an  amended 
form  it  will  be  transferred  to  Oxford.  The  Schools  of  Arts, 
Natural  Science,  History,  Law,  Medicine,  and  Theology,  in 
fact,  of  all  that  is  taught,  should  be  equally  opened  to  these 
graduates,  and  the  higher  degrees  in  each  Faculty  should  be 
conferred  on  those  who  deserve  them.  The  day  perhaps  is 
far  distant  when  at  Oxford  and  Cambridge  the  Master's  degree 
shall  no  longer  be  given  as  a  matter  of  course,  after  a  certain 
lapse  of  time,  and  on  the  payment  of  a  certain  sum  of  money. 
In  Oxford  a  beginning  has  been  made  with  the  degrees  in  Law. 
I  have  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  no  one  possessed  of 
an  ignorance  equal  in  amount  to  that  which  I  had  when  I 
took  the  degrees  of  Bachelor  and  Doctor  would  have  the  least 
chance  of  gaining  these  distinctions  now.  With  these  graduate 


318  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

students  the  first  step  in  reforming  the  Master's  degree  might 
very  properly  be  made.  Their  fitness  for  it  should  be  tested 
either  by  examination,  or  —  which  is  far  better  —  by  some 
piece  of  original  work.  The  residence  which  is  proposed  of 
one  year  —  of  five  and  twenty  weeks,  that  is  to  say  —  seems 
much  too  short.  Among  the  "  recognized  universities "  all 
should  be  recognized  which  are  worthy  of  recognition,  whether 
they  belong  to  one  of  our  colonies,  or  to  a  foreign  land.  That 
Respublica  Literatorum,  that  great  Commonwealth  of  Scholars 
to  which  Bodley  dedicated  his  noble  Library,  should  not  be 
bounded  and  divided  by  seas,  rivers,  and  mountains,  and  all 
the  limits  which  part  nation  from  nation.  For  its  citizens  no 
passports  should  be  needed,  and  no  letters  of  naturalization 
should  be  required.  In  every  university  the  scholar  should 
find  his  home ;  in  every  seat  of  learning  he  should  have  his 
right  of  domicile.  Like  the  Roman  State,  this  commonwealth 
should  extend  over  the  whole  civilized  world,  and  its  citizen- 
ship should  be  obtained,  not  by  birth,  but  with  a  great  sum  — 
the  toil  of  years.  Wherever  the  standard  of  learning  is  on  a 
level  with  ours,  the  graduates  of  that  university,  when  they 
come  to  study  with  us,  should  hold  the  same  rank  as  they  had 
held  at  home.  The  Bachelor  of  Arts  from  Harvard  or  Yale 
should  at  Oxford  or  Cambridge  wear  the  Bachelor's  gown.  If 
he  disgraced  it  by  idleness  or  misconduct,  he  should  at  once 
have  it  stripped  from  his  shoulders.  He  should  wear  it  on 
sufferance,  but  on  a  noble  and  generous  sufferance.  The  gra- 
duates who  came  from  the  inferior  seats  of  learning,  whether 
English  or  foreign,  might  very  properly  be  placed  in  an  inferior 
position  till  they  had  gone  through  a  certain  amount  of  study. 
This  is  done  at  Harvard.  I  was  told  of  a  young  Bachelor  of 
Arts  from  one  of  the  Canadian  universities  who  would  have 


xix.  HARVARD  COLLEGE.  319 

had  to  enter  as  a  Senior  had  he  not  appealed  to  the  high 
honours  which  he  had  taken  in  his  final  examination.  Even  the 
undergraduates,  who,  at  the  rate  of  about  fifty  a  year,  flock  in 
there  from  other  universities,  do  not,  by  any  means,  altogether 
lose  whatever  standing  they  had  already  acquired.  They  go 
before  the  Committee  on  Admission,  who,  measuring  the  work 
which  they  had  hitherto  done  and  the  position  which  they  had 
held  "  by  Harvard  standards,"  determine  in  which  of  the  four 
Classes  they  shall  each  be  placed.1  Almost  all  of  them,  I  was 
told,  would  be  admitted  "  a  year  short."  A  Senior,  that  is  to 
say,  would  be  reckoned  as  a  Junior,  a  Junior  as  a  Sophomore, 
and  a  Sophomore  as  a  Freshman.  Those,  however,  who  come 
from  Yale,  and  perhaps  from  one  or  two  other  Universities,  are 
not  thus  degraded. 

I  hope  that  the  day  is  not  far  distant  when  the  never-failing 
stream  of  American  students  which,  like  the  Gulf  Stream,  sets 
eastwards,  shall  be  diverted  from  Germany  and  flow  towards 
England  ;  when  the  graduate  of  Harvard  and  Yale  and  of  many 
another  University  shall  wear  the  gown  in  the  Colleges  of  Oxford 
and  Cambridge,  and  tread  the  cloisters  which  were  trodden  by 
their  forefathers.  Towards  England,  the  mother-country,  the 
Old  Home,  the  land  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  whose  towns, 
streets,  rivers,  fields,  hedge-rows,  lanes  have  by  poetry,  history, 
biography  and  fiction  been  made  scarcely  less  dear  and  scarcely 
less  familiar  to  the  gentle  reader  than  his  own  New  England, 
this  stream  would  surely  naturally  set.  How  their  scholars 
have  loved  "  this  little  world,  this  precious  stone  set  in  the  sil- 
ver sea,  "this  dear,  dear  land,"  in  spite  of  our  coldness,  in  spite 
of  our  unkindness,  in  spite  of  our  arrogance,  in  spite  of  all  the 
sufferings  of  the  War  of  Independence,  in  spite  of  the  insolence 
1  Harvard  University,  by  F.  Bolles,  p.  53. 


320  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

which  brought  on  the  War  of  1812,  in  spite  of  the  loud  applause 
given  by  the  classes,  though  not  by  the  people,  to  the  Southern 
slaveholders  in  their  cruel  struggle  against  liberty  and  the 
Union,  in  spite  of  the  insults  offered  to  the  Northern  patriots, 
to  a  man  like  Lowell  with  his  warm  and  generous  heart,  as  if 
the  army  in  which  fell  his  three  nephews  ("  the  hope  of  our 
race  ")  and  his  three  cousins  were  "  an  army  officered  by  tai- 
lors' apprentices  and  butcher  boys."  1  The  wrong,  I  know,  has 
not  been  all  on  one  side ;  arrogance  has  of  old  been  met  with 
arrogance,  insolence  with  insolence,  and  wrong-doing  with 
wrong-doing.  The  blundering  selfishness  of  the  American 
nation  has  brought,  and  is  still  bringing,  misery  to  many  a  poor 
English  home,  by  destroying  that  twice-blessed  freedom  of 
trade  which  blesseth  him  that  gives  and  him  that  takes ;  that 
freedom  which  everywhere  alike  gives  the  poor  man  his  bread, 
not  only  in  greater  abundance  but  all  "  the  sweeter  because  it  is 
no  longer  leavened  with  a  sense  of  injustice."  The  ungenerous 
treatment  of  our  authors,  men  who  have  spread  knowledge 
and  happiness  broadcast  through  their  land  and  have  been 
robbed  of  their  reward,  though  not  so  bad  as  it  had  so  long 
been,  still  goes  on.  Nevertheless  the  balance  of  wrong-doing 
—  if  the  balance  of  the  last  hundred  and  twenty  years  should 
now  be  struck  —  lies  heavily  against  us.  Yet  in  spite  of  all 
this,  how  dear  England  is  to  many  and  many  an  American  ! 
Though  they  never  seem  to  forget  that  they  are  with  foreigners 
when  in  our  company,  while  we  so  easily  forget  that  we  are 
with  foreigners  when  in  theirs,  nevertheless  in  New  England, 
among  people  of  any  education,  there  is  a  far  more  friendly 
feeling  towards  England  and  the  English  than  there  exists 
among  us  towards  America  and  the  Americans.  How  can  they 

1  Letters  of  J,  R.  Lowell,  II.  II,  159. 


xix.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  321 

help  loving  the  land  not  only  of  their .  forefathers,  but  of  their 
own  day-dreams  and  their  imagination ;  the  land  peopled  for 
them  by  Chaucer,  Shakespeare,  Clarendon,  Pepys,  Addison, 
Goldsmith,  Boswell,  Jane  Austen,  Scott,  Macaulay,  Dickens, 
and  by  many  another  famous  writer  with  that  strange  host, 
some  the  children  of  fancy,  others  once  real  men  and  women, 
but  now,  having  passed  through  a  great  author's  hands,  little 
more  than  the  children  of  fancy ;  some  so  odd,  some  so  full  of 
humour,  some  so  tender  and  pitiful,  some  so  rough  and  master- 
ful, some  so  wise  and  lovable,  some  so  foolish  and  no  less  lova- 
ble ?  This  is  the  land  of  the  Temple  Garden,  where  Somerset 
and  Richard  Plantagenet  plucked  the  red  rose  and  the  white, 
and  of  Brick  Court  hard  by  where,  bewailed  by  the  poor  and 
the  outcast,  Oliver  Goldsmith  died ;  of  Clement's  Inn,  where 
Falstaff  and  Shallow  heard  the  chimes  at  midnight ;  of  West- 
minster Abbey,  where  the  Spectator  looking  upon  the  tombs  of 
the  great  felt  every  motion  of  envy  die  in  him ;  of  Westminster 
Bridge,  where  Wordsworth  saw  "  a  sight  so  touching  in  [its 
majesty  "  ;  of  the  little  Chapel  in  the  Tower ;  of  Fleet  Street, 
"  the  most  delightful  scene  in  the  world,"  more  delightful,  John- 
son and  Boswell  thought,  than  Tempe,  and  of  Charing  Cross 
"with  its  full  tide  of  human  existence."  It  is  the  land  of  the 
cathedrals  and  castles ;  of  the  old-fashioned  inns  which  still 
help  to  form  "  the  felicity  of  England " ;  of  Addison's  Walk 
and  the  Bodleian  ;  of  the  silver  Thames  and  the  sedgy  Severn ; 
of  the  beautiful  country  life,  the  parks,  the  lawns,  the  ivy- 
mantled  towers  each  with  its  peal  of  bells,  the  green  fields,  the 
winding  lanes.  "The  country,"  wrote  Ticknor,  "is  much  more 
beautiful  than  I  thought  any  country  could  be." J  A  New 
England  minister  has  recorded  how  eighty  years  ago  he  was 

1  Life  of  George  Ticknor,  I.  56. 
Y 


322  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

gazing  at  a  print-shop,  when  two  men  who  were  passing  along 
stopped  to  look  at  a  picture  in  the  window.  " '  Do  you  not 
recognize  it?'  said  one  of  them  to  his  companion.  'Oh  yes,' 
was  the  reply ;  '  it  is  Guildhall.'  I  had  some  feeling  akin  to 
sublimity  in  the  thought  that  I  was  standing  so  near  two  gentle- 
men at  once  who  had  travelled  to  London  and  seen  Guild- 
hall." l  "  What  shall  I  say  of  London,"  wrote  Longfellow ; 
"of  my  pilgrimage  to  Temple  Bar,  Eastcheap,  and  Little 
Britain?  Indeed,  I  know  not  what  to  say."2  "My  heart 
bounded  when  I  caught  the  first  sight  of  England,"  an  ancient 
dame  said  to  me.  "  I  love  every  inch  of  it,"  said  another  lady. 
I  asked  a  distinguished  scholar,  a  man  sprung  of  the  best  New 
England  stock,  whether  an  American  was  touched  by  Shake- 
speare's glorious  praise  of  England.  "Your  forefathers,"  I  said, 
"would  have  felt  it  as  Englishmen."  With  his  gentle  and 
thoughtful  smile,  he  replied  that  there  were  roots  in  him  which 
went  down  deeper  in  England  than  even  in  his  own  country.  An 
old  country  lawyer  who  had  never  crossed  the  Atlantic  despised 
all  mankind  but  the  English  stock.  We  were  talking  one  day 
of  the  Southern  States.  "It  was  not  unlikely,"  I  said,  "that 
in  some  of  them  the  negroes  by  enduring  the  climate  better 
might  in  the  end  supplant  the  descendants  of  the  English." 
He  scornfully  replied :  "  I  don't  know  anything  but  God 
Almighty  that  can  kill  an  Anglo-Saxon."  The  great-grand- 
fathers of  these  New  Englanders  before  the  fatal  shot  was 
fired  at  Concord  Bridge  would  have  felt  the  proud  boast, — 

"  That  Chatham's  language  was  their  mother  tongue, 
And  Wolfe's  great  name  compatriot  with  their  own." 

1  Life  of  Benjamin  Sittintan,  II.  150. 

2  Life  of  H.  W.  Longfellow,  I.  170. 


xix.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  323 

Their  children  now  say  with  Wordsworth  :  — 

"  We  must  be  free  or  die,  who  speak  the  tongue 
That  Shakespeare  spake ;  the  faith  and  morals  hold 
Which  Milton  held.  —  In  everything  we  are  sprung 
Of  earth's  first  blood,  have  titles  manifold." 

"They  are  islanders,"  wrote  Prescott  of  us,  with  all  the  gene- 
rous enthusiasm  of  a  scholar  and,  I  would  fain  believe,  with 
all  the  pride  of  kinship,  "  they  are  islanders  cut  off  from  the 
great  world.  But  their  island  is  indeed  a  world  of  its  own. 
With  all  their  faults,  never  has  the  sun  shone  —  if  one  may  use 
the  expression  in  reference  to  England  —  on  a  more  noble 
race ;  or  one  that  has  done  more  for  the  great  interests  of 
humanity."1  "They  have  the  proudest  history  in  the  world," 
wrote  Emerson.  "Would  to  God,"  said  Judge  Story,  "that  I 
could  see  Westminster  Hall,  and  the  Abbey,  and  the  Houses 
of  Parliament.  A  cluster  of  recollections  belongs  to  them, 
almost  unexampled  in  the  history  of  the  world."2  Lowell,  in 
all  "the  bitterness  (half  resentment  and  half  regret)"  which 
he  felt  towards  England  at  the  close  of  the  Slaveholders'  War, 
could  still  say :  "  I  know  what  the  land  we  sprung  from,  and 
which  we  have  not  disgraced,  is  worth  to  freedom  and  civiliza- 
tion."3 He  added:  "We  have  not  a  thought  nor  a  hope 
that  is  not  American."  But  here  in  his  anger  he  deceived  him- 
self. He  was  never  one  of  those  who  held  that  "  the  felicity 
of  the  American  colonists  consisted  in  their  escape  from  the 
past." 4  The  past  was  too  much  for  him ;  except,  indeed,  in 
the  very  heat  of  the  great  war  it  was  always  with  him.  Even 

1  Life  of  W.  H.  Prescott,  p.  320. 

2  Life  of  Joseph  Slory,  II.  445. 

8  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  I.  402. 
*  Works  of  Daniel  Webster,  I.  101. 


324  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

American  spelling  he  would  not  tolerate.  "  Why  do  you  give 
in  to  these  absurdities?  "  he  wrote  to  a  brother- author  who  had 
spelt  mouldered  moldered.  "  Why  abscond  into  this  petty  creek 
from  the  great  English  main  of  orthography?"1  Except  in 
his  own  pleasant  home  in  Cambridge,  nowhere  in  his  old  age 
was  he  so  happy  as  in  England.  He  returned  to  it  again  and 
again.  "This  is  my  ninth  year  at  Whitby,"  he  wrote,  "and 
the  place  loses  none  of  its  charm  for  me." 2  "  There  is  not  a 
corner  of  England  that  has  not  its  special  charm,"  he  had 
written  three  years  earlier.3  But  in  earlier  days,  long  before 
his  fame,  his  great  position,  and  his  beautiful  character  and 
scholarly  mind  had  won  for  him  a  place  among  us  so  high  that 
it  would  have  softened  even  the  surliest  Yankee  and  made  him 
fond  of  England,  he  loved  the  island  for  itself.  To  a  friend 
he  wrote  nearly  forty  years  ago :  "  I  will  envy  you  a  little 
your  delightful  two  months  in  England  —  and  a  picture  rises 
before  me  of  long  slopes  washed  with  a  cool  lustre  of  watery 
sunshine  —  a  swan-silenced  reach  of  sallow- fringed  river  — 
great  humps  of  foliage  contrasting  taper  spires  —  cathedral 
domes,  gray  Gothic  fronts  elbowed  by  red-brick  deaneries  — 
broad  downs  clouded  with  cumulous  sheep." 4  "  Hereditary 
instincts,"  he  told  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen,  "  enabled  him  to  appre- 
ciate our  English  scenery."5  He  was  meditating  one  more 
visit  to  us  when  the  illness  came  upon  him,  from  which  he 
never  recovered.  Had  he  died  among  us,  surely  his  last 
resting-place  would  have  been  in  Westminster  Abbey. 

What  a  hold  should  we  get  on  men  of  the  noblest  minds  in 
the  United  States,  and  through  them  on  their  countrymen,  did 
we  open  wide  our  universities  !  What's  Germany  to  them  or 

1  Letters  of  J.  R.  Lowell,  II.  294. 

2  Ib.  II.  421.          8  Ib.  II.  356.          *  Ib.  I.  300.          6  Ib.  II.  501. 


xix.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  325 

they  to  Germany  ?  To  England  the  young  students  could  not 
help  coming  if  a  welcome  were  given  them,  and  if  in  every 
one  of  the  Arts  and  Sciences,  teaching  and  opportunities  for 
original  work  were  provided  worthy  of  a  great  university. 
When  Oxford  and  Cambridge  have  each  their  great  Graduate 
School,  a  School  of  men  indifferent  to  honours  and  unworried 
by  examinations,  then  that  blessed  time  will  not  be  far  distant. 
If  once  we  get  hold  of  these  young  Americans,  we  will  defy 
them  to  pass  through  Balliol  or  Magdalen  or  New  College,  and 
not  love  Oxford  and  England.  Prescott,  the  evening  before 
his  death,  said  of  us  to  a  friend :  "  What  a  hearty  and  noble 
people  they  are,  and  how  an  American's  heart  warms  towards 
them  after  he  has  been  in  England  once,  and  found  them  out 
in  their  hospitable  homes  I"1  " Each  traveller  makes  his  own 
England,"  writes  Dr.  Holmes.2  Not  altogether  so,  most  gentle 
of  Autocrats.  We  Englishmen  can  do  something  towards 
making  it  for  him.  We  can  make  him  feel  that  it  is  not  among 
a  strange  people  that  he  has  come ;  that  it  is  by  no  waters 
of  Babylon  that  he  sitteth  himself  down.  Few  men  can  any- 
where feel  more  strongly  the  sense  of  loneliness  than  the 
American  scholar  who  knowing  nobody  wanders  through 
England.  Those  who 

"  At  the  purple  dawn  of  day 
Tadmor's  marble  waste  survey  " 

are  scarcely  more  solitary  than  the  young  New  Englander 
without  a  friend  in  the  land  of  his  forefathers,  and  in  the  land 
of  his  books.  The  very  words  Old  Home,  which  had  so  plea- 
sant a  sound  far  off,  add  to  his  desolation.  He  is  like  a  man 

1  Life  of  W.  H.  Prescott,  p.  442. 

2  R.  W.  Emerson,  p.  218. 


326  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

who  after  the  lapse  of  years  comes  back  to  his  old  College  and 
finds  nobody  who  knows  him.  He  sees  the  new  names  above 
the  doors.  Many  a  New  Englander  visits  the  English  village 
in  which  his  forefathers  lived  two  centuries  and  a  half  ago. 
He  wanders  about  it,  thinking  how  once  to  those  of  his  name 
there  was  not  a  house  that  would  not  have  been  open ;  he  goes 
into  the  old  church  and  sits  where  his  ancestors  sat ;  in  his  old 
home  he  is  utterly  a  stranger.  He  passes  through  England, 
seeing  all  its  beauties,  visiting  like  a  pilgrim  many  a  spot  of 
which  he  had  dreamt  since  the  day  when  books  first  took  hold 
of  him,  but  living  in  inns  and  knowing  nobody  but  landlords 
and  waiters.  Those  friends,  once  so  real  and  still  so  dear, 
with  whom  so  often  in  his  New  England  parlour  he  had  laughed 
and  wept,  in  their  own  homes  are  for  the  first  time  found  to  be 
shadows.  They  all  "are  melted  into  air,  into  thin  air."  Whefe 
he  could  love  so  much  he  finds  no  one  even  to  give  him  a 
hand.  "England,"  said  an  American  to  me,  "is  a  country 
where  a  foreigner  meets  with  the  greatest  hospitality  and  the 
greatest  neglect.  There  is  no  people  so  hospitable  as  the 
English,  if  you  have  an  introduction  to  them.  If  there  is  the 
tiniest  little  tag  on  which  to  hang  hospitality,  no  one  can  be 
more  hospitable  than  an  Englishman ;  but  if  there  is  no  intro- 
duction, no  one  can  stand  more  aloof."  Our  ancient  univer- 
sities could  so  easily  provide  a  noble  "  tag "  indeed.  What 
ever- widening  circles  of  friendship  would  in  them  be  formed — 
circles  which  would  in  time  include  hundreds  and  thousands  of 
gentle  spirits  and  cordial  hearts  on  both  sides  of  the  wide 
Atlantic  !  In  Boston,  on  the  walls  of  the  Massachusetts  His- 
torical Society,  hang  two  swords  crossed.  They  once  hung 
above  the  books  in  Prescott's  library.  One  of  them  had  been 
worn  by  his  father's  father  on  Bunker  Hill,  the  other  by  his 


xix.  HARVARD   COLLEGE.  327 

mother's  father  on  an  English  sloop-of-war  which,  from  the 
river  below,  cannonaded  the  patriots.  For  fifty  years  and  more 
they  have  been  crossed  in  peace  in  the  gentle  seats  of  learning 
—  a  symbol,  I  trust,  of  that  unruffled  harmony,  that  perfect 
good-will,  which  some  day  by  the  help  of  books,  scholars,  and 
universities,  shall  be  established  between  the  great  and  kindred 
nations. 

Before  many  years  have  passed  by,  Harvard  in  every  one  of 
her  Schools  will  supply  her  students  with  that  higher  learning 
in  search  of  which  they  have  so  long  resorted  to  Europe. 
"Our  day  of  dependence,"  said  Emerson  nearly  sixty  years 
ago,  "  our  long  apprenticeship  to  the  learning  of  other  lands, 
draws  to  a  close." l  Nevertheless,  her  young  scholars  will  still 
cross  the  Atlantic  in  the  same  noble  quest.  It  is  not  only  the 
Libraries,  the  Museums,  the  Art  Collections,  the  ancient  sites 
and  monuments  of  the  Old  World  which  will  bring  them.  More 
than  for  all  these,  they  will  come  to  live  for  a  while  in  the  midst 
of  those  great  floating  traditions  of  learning  and  mental  refine- 
ment, that  priceless  possession  handed  down  from  far  distant 
centuries,  and  ever  growing  as  it  passed  from  one  generation  to 
another.  These  traditions  well-nigh  perished  in  the  severity  of 
the  Puritans'  character  and  in  the  prolonged  struggle  with  a 
barren  soil  and  a  stern  climate.  In  later  years  their  growth  has 
been  checked  by  the  swift  and  victorious  march  westward  over 
a  country  so  rich  and  fruitful  that  by  the  restless  ambition  which 
it  exerted  it  destroyed  that  repose  in  which  learning  and  refine- 
ment are  best  nurtured. 

While  their  students  must  spend  some  time  in  Europe,  I 
trust  that  before  long  many  a  scholar  fresh  from  Oxford  and 
Cambridge  will  cross  the  Atlantic  to  finish  his  studies  in  Har- 

1  Works,  1884, 1.  65. 


328  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  CHAP. 

vard.  More  than  one  hundred  years  ago  that  generous  bene- 
factor of  the  College,  the  old  London  merchant,  Thomas 
Hollis,  seeing  Oxford  and  Cambridge  closed  to  the  Noncon- 
formists, turned  his  eyes  towards  Harvard  as  the  place  where 
English  ministers  might  be  educated.  "To  train  them  up 
in  arts  and  sciences,"  he  wrote,  "would  be  a  method  to 
correct  mean  and  ignorant  explications  and  applications  of 
Scripture,  attended  with  a  little  enthusiasm l  too  often,  which 
narrows  that  catholic  charity  among  all  Christians,  recommended 
by  the  apostles  of  our  Lord  Jesus.  I  should  rejoice  to  hear 
your  College  was  well  furnished  with  Professors  in  every  science 
that  young  students  might  be  completely  instructed  in  the 
ministry,  and  our  ministers  at  London  might  encourage  the 
sending  such  like  youth  to  Harvard  College,  instead  of  Leyden 
and  Utrecht,  our  present  practice."  2  Happily  one  part  of 
Hollis's  wish  has  at  last  been  fulfilled.  In  every  science  the 
University  is  well  furnished  with  Professors,  while  there  are 
departments  in  the  Graduate  School  where  our  best  men  might 
study  with  profit.  But  the  greatest  profit  of  all  would  be  the 
residence  among  a  people  so  like  and  yet  so  unlike.  Here 
the  student  of  history,  political  science,  and  political  economy 
might  study,  as  it  were,  in  a  great  Life-School.  Nowhere 
could  a  man  get  more  quickly  or  more  thoroughly  cured  of 
what  Lowell  calls  "  the  English  genius  for  thinking  all  the 
rest  of  mankind  unreasonable."  "There  is  one  thing,"  he 
adds,  "  Englishmen  always  take  for  granted,  namely,  that  an 
American  must  see  the  superiority  of  England."3  At  Harvard 

1  Enthusiasm  he  uses  in  the  sense  which  it  commonly  bore  through  the 
greater  part  of  last  century :  "  a  vain  belief  of  private  revelation." 
2Quincy's  Harvard,  I.  434. 
8  Letters  ofj.  R.  Lowell,  II.  405. 


xix.  HARVARD    COLLEGE.  329 

"the  freshening  western  blast "  would  sweep  away  that  and  a 
few  other  insular  prejudices  besides.  Here,  too,  the  young 
student  of  Oxford  or  Cambridge  would  see  a  great  university 
greatly  ruled.  He  would  return  home  loving  his  own  College 
and  his  own  University  more  than  ever,  but  resolved  that  so  far 
as  it  in  him  lay,  they  shall  be  still  worthier  of  the  love  and 
reverence  felt  for  them  by  their  children. 


INDEX. 


Adams,  Charles  Francis,  301. 
Adams,  President  John  Quincy,  109, 

114,  211. 

Adams,  John  Quincy,  301. 
Adams,  Samuel,  51. 
Addison,  Joseph,  73. 
Adler,  Felix,  48. 
Admission,  Committee  on,  319. 
Advisers,  Committee  of,  232. 
Agassiz,  Professor  Louis,  82,  138,  218, 

266. 

Agassiz,  Mrs.,  275. 
Agassiz,  Professor  Alexander,  266. 
Agriculture,  School  of,  160. 
Alcoholic  liquors,  83,  89,  121,  174. 
Alexander,  Emperor  of  Russia,  179. 
Allen,  Rev.  W.,  9. 
Ames,  Professor  James  Barr,  261. 
Ames,  Frederick  Lothrop,  296. 
Amherst  College,  41. 
Ancient  Customs  of  Harvard  College,  57. 
Andrew,  John  Albion,  17. 
Association  of  Alumni,  98. 
Athleticism,  117,  136,  143,  149,  152. 
Auld  Lang  Syne,  123. 


Bancroft,  George,  301. 

Bancroft, ,  151. 

Baseball,  138. 
Baths,  175. 
Bemis,  George,  19. 
Bequests.    See  Endowments. 
Berkeley,  Bishop,  286. 
Bismarck,  Prince,  223. 
Blaschka,  Messrs.,  268. 
Bloody  Monday,  63. 


Boarding-houses,  168. 

Boat-races,  147,  151. 

Bodley,  Sir  Thomas,  318. 

Bolles,  Frank,  164. 

Bonaparte,  Jerome,  210. 

Bonaparte,  Charles  Joseph,  301. 

Boston,  "  the  Literary  Emporium,"  211. 

Boston  Sunday  Globe,  203. 

Boys,  136,  187. 

Brandeis,  Louis  D.,  260. 

Brattle,  Major,  81. 

Brattle,  Thomas,  81. 

Brewster,  "  Sir,"  7. 

Bright,  John,  182,  235. 

Brilliants,  248. 

Brooks,  Bishop  Phillips,  48,  53. 

Brooks,  Preston  S.,  41. 

Bryce,  Right  Hon.  James,  306. 

Bulkeley,  "  Sir,"  7. 

Burgoyne,  General,  34. 

Burlingame,  Anson,  179. 

Burne-Jones,  Sir  Edward,  in,  171. 

Burney,  Dr.  Charles,  184. 

Butler,  Bishop,  184. 

Butler,  General,  97. 


Cambridge  University,  endowments, 
21 ;  Emmanuel  College,  23,  27 ; 
founders  of  Harvard,  23,  159;  ex- 
aminations, 243,  246;  Colleges  for 
Women,  274;  graduate  study,  317. 

Campus,  57. 

Caps  and  gowns,  59,  154. 

Carlyle,  Dr.  Alexander,  n. 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  105,  113,  290. 

Carter,  Mrs.,  13. 

331 


332 


INDEX. 


Catalogue,  Triennial,  29. 
Centenary  of  1836,  23,  37. 
Channing,  Professor  Edward  Tyrrel, 

75- 

Channing,  Dr.  William  Ellery,  33,  188, 
286. 

Chapel,  46,  167. 

Charles  I.,  291. 

Charles  II.,  42. 

Charter  of  Harvard  College,  159,  298. 

Charter  of  Massachusetts,  42. 

Chauncy,  President,  7,  57. 

Chesterfield,  Earl  of,  29,  191. 

Child,  Professor  Francis  James,  115, 
125,  273,  294. 

Chores,  193. 

Christmas,  182. 

Chumming,  162,  171. 

Class  Day,  120. 

Classes,  100. 

Clay,  Henry,  108. 

Cleveland,  President,  180. 

Clubs,  63,  176 ;  Democratic  Campaign 
Club,  180;  Dickey  Club,  178;  Fox- 
croft  Club,  173,  204;  Harvard  Re- 
publican Club,  180 ;  Medical  Faculty 
Club,  179 ;  Musical  Clubs,  182. 

Cobden,  Richard,  235. 

Commemoration  of  1886,  27. 

Commencement,  31,  82,  120,  155. 

Common,  Cambridge,  30,  85. 

Commons,  166. 

Concord,  33,  122. 

Conington,  Professor,  220. 

Corporal  punishment,  55. 

Corporation,  298. 

Council,  305. 

Courses  of  study,  231. 

Crammers,  201. 

Cranmer,  Archbishop,  53. 

Creighton,  Bishop,  27. 

Cromwell,  Oliver,  23. 

Currency,  14,  84. 

Curtis,  Benjamin  R.,  223,  224,  256. 

Curtis,  George  William,  115,  281. 

Gushing,  Caleb,  29,  121. 

Dana,  Richard,  9. 


Dana,  Richard  H.,  9,  40,  82,  103,  115, 

138,  255. 

Dane,  Nathan,  254. 
Dartmouth  College,  210. 
Darwin,  Charles  Robert,  106,  ill. 
Davis,  A.  M.,  283. 
Davy,  Sir  Humphry,  214. 
De  Quincey,  Thomas,  168. 
Dean  of  the  College,  303. 
Degrees,  94,  250,  317. 
Depot,  169. 

Derby,  Earl  of,  27,  194,  221. 
Dicey,  Professor  Albert  Venn,  254. 
Dickens,  Charles,  183. 
Dilly,  Messrs.,  288. 
Diogenes  Laertius,  246. 
Divinity  School,  44,  225. 
Donations.    See  Endowments. 
Dormitories,  161,  171. 
Douglass,  Frederick,  126. 
Downing,  Sir  George,  7. 
Draper,  George,  19. 
Dress,  31,  64,  198. 
Drummond,  Professor,  48. 
Dudley,  Joseph,  48. 
Dunster,  President,  7,  299. 
Durant,  H.  F.,  282. 

Elective  studies,  228,  293. 

Elementary  education,  235. 

Eleutheria,  10. 

Eliot,  President  Charles  William,  Di- 
vinity School,  45 ;  speech  at  Com- 
mencement, 105;  Phi  Beta  day,  117; 
Class  Day,  130;  hours  for  lectures, 
145 ;  athleticism,  149, 152;  rich  young 
men,  206;  elective  system,  228,  232, 
244;  secondary  school  studies,  236, 
238 ;  Harvard  and  her  teachers,  251 ; 
Law  School,  253,  257,  258,  263 ;  Sci- 
entific School,  266;  Charter,  298; 
retiring  allowance  fund,  305;  Presi- 
dency, 306. 

Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo,  singing,  3; 
Fugitive  Slave  Law,  40;  Saturday 
Club,  82,  138;  Phi  Beta  Poet,  112; 
Phi  Beta  President,  115;  class  en- 
thusiasm, 137;  chumming,  162 ;  lines 


INDEX. 


333 


on  duty,  169;  portrait  in  Memorial 
Hall,  170;  elected  to  a  club,  179; 
first  sermon,  192  ;  President's  Fresh- 
man, 193;  Everett's  coming  from 
Germany,  216 ;  ideal  university,  229 ; 
lines  on  Samuel  Hoar,  301 ;  English 
history,  323;  America's  apprentice- 
ship, 327. 

Employment  Bureau,  200. 

Endicott,  Governor,  301. 

Endowments,  bequests,  and  gifts,  8-20, 
169,  207,  254,  266,  285,  287,  289,  309. 

Everett,  Edward,  25,  40,  73,  75,  87,  88, 
114,  211,  216. 

Everett,  William,  78. 

Examinations,  79,  230,  239,  245. 

Exeter  Academy,  236. 

Expenses,  162,  172,  191,  207. 

Faculties,  303. 

Fagging,  57. 

Fair  Harvard,  26,  129,  276. 

Fellows,  8,  43,  52,  298,  302. 

Felton,  Professor  Cornelius  C.,  40, 114. 

Fines,  50,  56. 

Football,  147. 

Franklin,  Benjamin,  287. 

Free  Masonry,  108. 

Freeman,  Edward  Augustus,  160,  214, 

SIS- 

Freshmen,  57,  176,  232. 
Froude,  James  Anthony,  214,  313. 
Furniture,  165. 

Gale,  Dr.  Theophilus,  9,  285. 

Gardiner,  Samuel  Rawson,  313. 

Garfield,  President,  73,  203. 

Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  37,  41,  101. 

Gatting,  161. 

Geneva,  University  of,  278. 

George  III.,  30,  35. 

German  books,  210,  219. 

German  universities,  161, 210, 225,  227, 

263. 

Gibbon,  Edward,  161. 
Gilman,  Arthur,  275. 
Gladstone,  Right  Hon.  William  Ewart, 

184. 


Glee  Club,  3. 

Goethe,  213. 

Goldsmith,  Oliver,  188,  191,  194. 

Goodale.Professor  George  Lincoln,  268. 

Goodwin,  Professor  William  Watson, 
benefactors  of  Harvard,  15 ;  future 
of  Harvard,  46;  Dr.  Popkin,  78; 
Phi  Beta  Society,  109;  College  and 
University,  157;  Harvard  modelled 
on  an  English  college,  but  assimi- 
lated to  a  German  university,  160, 
225,  227 ;  examinations  and  the 
elective  system,  189,  230,  244 ;  school 
education,  235,  238,  239  ;  graduate 
school,  248,  250;  German  univer- 
sities, 263;  foreign  schemes,  266; 
College  for  Women,  273. 

Gore,  Christopher,  289. 

Gottingen,  210,  223. 

Gould,  Jay,  19. 

Government,  297. 

Governor  of  Massachusetts,  92,  96. 

Grace,  Dr.,  149. 

Graduate  School,  160,  242,  248,  250. 

Grammar  Schools,  237. 

Greek,  5,  210,  230,  243. 

Greenleaf,  Simon,  256,  258. 

Greenough,  Professor  James  Brad- 
street,  273. 

Grouping,  71. 

Hale,  Dr.  Edward  Everett,  53,  93. 

Hancock,  Governor,  32,  35,  108. 

Hancock,  Thomas,  19. 

Harrison,  General,  180. 

Harte,  Bret,  115. 

Harvard,  John,  statue,  4;  bequest,  8; 

library,  9,  285, 287 ;  Master  of  Arts  of 

Emmanuel  College,  23,  28  ;  house, 

104. 

Harvard  College  and  University,  157. 
Harvard  Graduates,  291. 
Harvard  indifference,  188. 
Harvard  Law  Review,  263. 
Harvard  spirit,  142,  190. 
Harvard  Stories,  153. 
Harvard  Studies  in  Classical  Philology \ 

103. 


334 


INDEX. 


Harvard  yell,  93, 141. 

Harwood,  Dr.  Edward,  54. 

Hastings  Dormitory,  174. 

Hawkins,  Provost,  50,  68. 

Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  128,  138,  215. 

Hazing,  60. 

Hearne,  Thomas,  73. 

Heberden,  Dr.  William,  288. 

Hedge,  Professor,  78. 

Herford,  Dr.  Brooke,  47. 

Higginson,  Colonel  Thomas  W.,  121. 

Hoar,  Samuel,  301. 

Holden  Chapel,  12. 

Holland,  Mr.,  285. 

Hollis  family,  12. 

Hollis,  Thomas,  12,  286,  328. 

Holmes,  John,  102. 

Holmes,  Dr.  Oliver  Wendell,  the 
wealth  of  the  New  World,  18 ;  Cen- 
tenary, 27 ;  the  Brattle  House,  81 ; 
Saturday  Club,  82;  lines  on  the 
Cambridge  churches,  86;  Class  of 
1829,  102;  Emerson's  oration,  112; 
Phi  Beta,  115;  Class  Day  Poet,  125; 
athleticism,  137;  Emeritus  Profes- 
sor, 158 ;  England,  325. 

Holworthy,  Sir  Matthew,  12. 

Holworthy  Hall,  12. 

Holyoke,  President,  74. 

Hughes,  Thomas,  147. 

Huxley,  Professor,  106,  119. 

Ices,  172. 
Instructors,  306. 

James  II.,  72. 

Jeffreys,  Judge,  43. 

Jena  Professors,  212. 

Johns  Hopkins  University,  248. 

Johnson,  Dr.  Samuel,  note  on  Sir,  7 ; 
Thomas  Hollis,  13;  letter  to  Chester- 
field, 29;  "ground  dignified  by  wis- 
dom," 30 ;  Taxation  no  Tyranny,  35 ; 
"  yelps  for  liberty,"  38  ;  Dr.  Harwood, 
54;  inscriptions  in  English,  86 ;  lem- 
onade, 90  ;  chapel  at  Oxford,  167 ; 
Pilgrim's  Progress,  184 ;  Goldsmith's 


saying,  191  ;   servitors,  193 ;    dinner 
at  Messrs.  Dilly,  288. 
Jowett,  Professor  Benjamin,  220,  246. 

Keane,  Bishop,  49. 

Ken,  Bishop,  53. 

Kent,  Chancellor,  in. 

Kirkland,  President,  78,  88,  216,  308. 

Lafayette,  General,  87. 

Landor,  Walter  Savage,  in. 

Lane,  W.  C.,  295. 

Lane,  Professor  George  Martin,  305. 

Langdell,  Professor  Christopher  Co 
lumbus,  254,  257,  262. 

Latham,  Rev.  Mr.,  9. 

Latin,  5,  237. 

Laud,  Archbishop,  119. 

Law  School,  225,  253. 

Lawrence  Scientific  School,  160,  266. 

Lawrence,  Abbott,  266. 

Lawrence,  Bishop,  127,  129,  300. 

Lecturers,  305. 

Liberties  and  Orders  of  Harvard  Col* 
leg',  5- 

Liberty  Tree,  74,  121. 

Library,  8,  10,  285 ;  Law  Library,  261. 

Liddell,  Dean,  194. 

Lightfoot,  Dr.  John,  285. 

Lincoln,  President,  26,  106,  117,  311. 

Lincoln,  Robert,  105. 

Little,  Brown  &  Co.,  10. 

Loan-fund,  206. 

Loan-Furniture  Association,  164. 

London  University,  43. 

Longfellow,  Henry  Wadsworth,  house, 
30;  Sumner's  speech  in  1848,  40; 
Emerson  hooted,  41 ;  Professor,  46, 
215,  226;  College  dining-room,  73; 
rebellion  in  College,  76 ;  Dr.  Popkin, 
78;  Brattle  Street,  80;  Saturday 
Club,  82;  Emerson  as  a  lecturer, 
113;  Class  Day,  122,  125;  portrait  in 
Memorial  Hall,  170;  River  Charles, 
175;  Christmas,  182;  Jared  Sparks, 
227 ;  women  students,  273 ;  American 
poets,  291 ;  London,  322. 

Lotteries,  15. 


INDEX. 


335 


Lovejoy,  Elijah,  38. 

Lowell,  Charles  Russell,  170. 

Lowell,  James  Russell,  centenary,  27 ; 
Emmanuel  College  tercentenary,  28 ; 
Triennial  Catalogue,  29 ;  Washington 
Elm,  30;  Burgoyne's  army,  34;  Ab- 
olitionists, 38;  Fugitive  Slave  Law, 
40;  Dr.  Popkin,  78;  President 
Kirkland,  79,  216,  308;  Professors' 
Row,  80;  changing  names,  81; 
Saturday  Club,  82,  138 ;  Commence- 
ment, 84;  John  Holmes,  102;  Emer- 
son's oration,  112;  Phi  Beta,  115; 
Class  Day,  121,  125;  Professor 
Child's  Popular  Ballads,  126;  boat- 
race,  147;  Professor,  155;  portrait 
in  Memorial  Hall,  170;  Charles 
River,  175;  rusticated,  189;  Law 
School,  256 ;  Harvard  Library,  290 ; 
Harvard  Graduates,  291;  England, 
323.  328. 

Macaulay,  Lord,  193. 

Mansell,  Dean,  220. 

Mason,  Jeremiah,  112. 

Mather,  Cotton,  286. 

Matthews  Dormitory,  183. 

May,  Rev.  Samuel,  101. 

Maynard,  Sir  John,  9. 

Mead,  Dr.,  287. 

Meals,  10,  34,  166,  172.  ^ 

Medical  School,  99,  160,  225. 

Memorial  Hall,  169,  172. 

Milman,  Dean,  160. 

Milton,  John,  4,  23,  168,  290. 

Money-aids,  206. 

Moore,  Archbishop,  193. 

Morgan,  Professor  Morris  Hicky,  295. 

Morris,  William,  in. 

Motley,  John  Lothrop,  Fugitive  Slave 
Law,  40 ;  Brattle  House,  81 ;  Satur- 
day Club,  82,  138;  Phi  Beta,  no; 
portrait  in  Memorial  Hall,  170; 
on  novels,  189 ;  Gottingen,  223. 

Mowlson,  Lady,  283. 

Names,  change  of,  80. 
Negro  students,  17,  126. 


Nonconformists,  English,  n. 
North,  Lord,  35. 

Norton,  Professor  Charles  Eliot,  28,  29, 
158,  295,  307. 

Overseers,  298,  310. 

Oxford,  "  makes  an  American  unhap- 
py," i ;  Earl  of  Derby,  chancellor, 
27 ;  Anglicanism,  43 ;  attendance 
at  chapel,  49 ;  matriculation,  55 ; 
external  respect,  58 ;  caps  and  gowns, 
59,  157,  187;  riots,  61,  71;  dress,  64; 
social  life,  66,  72,  316;  Commemora- 
tion, 85,  94,  97,  124,  129 ;  representa- 
tives in  Parliament,  105;  Professor 
Huxley's  lecture,  106;  undergrad- 
uates, 134;  cricket-matches,  143; 
"  "Varsity,"  143 ;  hours  of  lectures, 
144;  boat-race,  147;  government, 
157,  160,  312;  "gateing,"  161 ; 
chumming,  162;  furniture,  164; 
licensed  lodgings,  165;  baths,  175; 
boat-club  subscriptions,  179;  servi- 
tors, 193;  scholarships,  206;  ex- 
penses, 207 ;  examinations,  209,  229, 
239,  242,  246,  250,  314;  Professors, 
214,  220;  Natural  Science  School, 
221 ;  Glasgow  students,  223 ;  elective 
studies,  242;  men  afraid  of  their 
reputation,  247;  Law  School,  263; 
Extension  Lectures,  269;  students 
excluded,  250, 270 ;  Radcliffe  Library, 
283;  Bodleian,  289,  295,  318;  prizes, 
247, 295 ;  students  from  abroad,  318  ; 
Colleges  —  All  Souls',  97;  Balliol, 
IX»  59.  77  >  Christ  Church,  51,  62, 
194;  Corpus  Christi,  285;  Exeter, 
194,  295;  Oriel,  50,  68;  Pembroke, 
49,  66,  145,  162,  163,  193,  219; 
Queen's,  59;  University,  34;  Halls 
for  Women,  274,  277. 

Palmer,  Professor  George  Herbert,  63, 

234- 

Parietal  Board,  65,  304. 
Parker,  Theodore,  103. 
Parkman,  Francis,  40. 
Parmele,  Elisha,  107. 


336 


INDEX. 


Parsons,  Theophilus,  256. 

Peabody,  George,  301. 

Peabody,  Professor,  hazing,  60;  tutors 
and  students,  70  ;  college  rebellions, 
75;  Dr.  Popkin,  77;  President 
Quincy,  81  ;  the  Common,  85;  life 
in  College,  163,  166;  instruction,  218. 

Pepys,  Samuel,  7. 

Percy,  Bishop,  184. 

Perkins  Hall,  19. 

Phi  Beta  Kappa  Society,  65,  87,  107, 
177. 

Phillips,  Wendell,  29,  39,  103,  116,  190. 

Pierce,  Rev.  John,  89,  103. 

Plate,  168. 

Policemen,  140. 

Poor  students,  164,  191. 

Popkin,  Professor,  77. 

Porter's  flip,  79. 

Potter,  Right  Rev.  H.  C,  48. 

Prescott,  William  Hickling,  matricula- 
tion, 79;  Phi  Beta,  no;  Carlyle's 
French  Revolution,  113;  Harvard 
degree,  124  ;  Saturday  Club,  138  ; 
Oxford  degree,  156  ;  eyesight  in- 
jured, 168;  portrait  in  Memorial 
Hall,  170;  mathematics,  228;  be- 
quest to  Library,  289;  England,  323, 
325;  ancestors'  swords,  326. 

President,  The,  298,  302,  306,  311. 

Probation,  139. 

Proctors,  166. 

Professors,  69,  226,  302,  305,  314. 

Quincy,  President,  popularity  in  repub- 
lics, 36  ;  discipline,  60  ;  odd  charac- 
ter, 81  ;  Commencement  Day,  85  ; 
Class  Day,  121  ;  College  plate,  168  ; 
attendance  at  chapel,  225. 

Quincy,  Josiah,  47,  88,  121. 


Radcliffe  College,  159,  273. 


, 

Rebellions,  32,  74. 
Research,  314,  317. 
Reveille,  114. 

Revenue,  8,  10,  13,  15,  309. 
Reviews,  202. 


Rhode  Island,  42. 
Ripley,  Rev.  Samuel,  192. 
Rogers,  Rev.  Mr.,  285. 
Roman  Catholics,  48. 
Room  rents,  162. 
Ruskin,  John,  HI. 
Russia,  180. 
Russian  naval  officers,  92,  97. 

Saltonstall,  Sir  Richard,  9,  301. 

Saturday  Club,  82,  138. 

Scarborough,  Maine,  9. 

Schools,  Secondary,  236. 

Schultze,  Dr.,  211. 

Sedgwick,  Professor  Adam,  214. 

Sewall,  Samuel,  90,  104,  183,  285. 

Shakespeare,  William,  286. 

Sheridan,  General,  170. 

Sherlock,  Bishop,  286. 

Shingles,  176. 

Shire,  9. 

Sibley,  J.  L.,  291. 

Silliman,  Professor  Benjamin,  51,  89, 
213. 

Slavery,  37,  85. 

Smith,  Adam,  n,  223. 

Smith,  Samuel  Francis,  102. 

Snaps,  233. 

South  Carolina,  37. 

Southampton,  Earl  of,  207. 

Southey,  Robert,  i. 

Sparks,  Jared,  40,  227. 

Special  Students,  270. 

Spelling,  324. 

Spreads,  122,  130. 
j  State  aids,  15. 

Stephen,  Leslie,  324. 

Story,  Joseph,  Centenary  of  1836,  23; 
War  of  Independence,  25 ;  Unitarian, 
44  '•  fagging,  60 ;  tutors  and  students, 
71 ;  Association  of  Alumni,  97 ; 
Classes,  100;  Commencement,  103; 
Phi  Beta,  109,  HI;  Class  Day  Poet, 
125 ;  portrait,  170 ;  foreign  countries, 
21 1 ;  Ticknor's  reforms,  217;  Pro- 
fessor, 254,  258;  Westminster  Hall, 

323. 
Story,  W.  W.f  121. 


INDEX. 


337 


Summer  School,  268,  309. 

Sumner,  Charles,  hooted  at  Cambridge, 
39;  assaulted  by  Brooks,  41;  buff 
waistcoat,  65;  Saturday  Club,  82; 
Phi  Beta,  in,  113,  115;  College 
bills,  207 ;  mathematics,  229 ;  Story's 
pupil,  255,  256 ;  pamphlets,  289. 

Suspension,  122. 

Swift,  Dean,  175. 

Swinburne,  Algernon  Charles,  in. 

Tea,  32. 

Thacher,  Professor,  51. 

Thayer,  W.  R.,  158. 

Thompson,  Maurice,  117. 

Ticknor,  George,  Fugitive  Slave  Law, 
40;  Phi  Beta,  in,  114;  Oxford  de- 
gree, 155;  Vacations,  198;  student 
of  Gottingen,  210;  Professor,  213; 
reforms,  215 ;  Prescott  and  mathe- 
matics, 228 ;  England,  321. 

Tory  Refugees,  288. 

Treasurer,  298. 

Trecothick,  Barlow,  288. 

Turnpikes,  33. 

Unitarianism,  44,  224. 
University  College,  London,  277. 

Vacations,  198. 
Vane,  Sir  Henry,  4. 
Vassall,  Colonel,  81. 
Vincent,  Bishop,  48. 

Wadham,  Nicholas,  4. 
Wadsworth,  President,  86. 
Walker,  General,  117. 


Walpole,  Horace,  13. 

Ware,  Professor,  80. 

Warren,  General,  24. 

Warren,  Dr.  John,  24. 

Washburn,  Emory,  256. 

Washington,  25. 

Washington,  George,  30,  34,  86. 

Washington,  Martha,  282. 

Washington  Elm,  36,  276. 

Watson,  Bishop,  207,  214. 

Weather,  127. 

Webb,  Henry,  10. 

Webster,  Daniel,  oratory,  26,  112; 
Abolitionists,  37 ;  Speech  of  March 
7,  1850,  40 ;  Lafayette,  87 ;  Com- 
mencement dinner,  90;  Phi  Beta 
dinner,  in;  Dartmouth  College, 
210 ;  America's  debt  to  Europe,  265. 

Weeds,  268. 

Wellesley  College,  142,  282. 

White,  D.  A.,  223. 

Whitefield,  Rev.  George,  30,  193,  195, 
288. 

Whittier,  John  Greenleaf,  82. 

William  III.,  9,  311. 

William  and  Mary  College,  107. 

Williams,  Roger,  42. 

Winsor,  Dr.  Justin,  292. 

Wordsworth,  William,  HI. 

Yale  College,  orthodox,  43;  chapel, 
51 ;  fondness  for  noise,  57 ;  baseball, 
138  ;  baths,  175  ;  toughs,  190 ;  poor 
students,  191,  196;  Professor  Silli- 
man,  213 ;  students  at  Harvard,  265. 

Yard,  The,  2. 


LADY  BALTIMORE 

By  OWEN  WISTER 

Author  of  "  The  Virginian,"  etc.,  etc. 

With  Numerous  Illustrations 
Cloth  12mo  $1.50 

"Another  Virginian"  and  "more  cowboys"  were  what  the  public 
asked  Mr.  Wister  for,  and  "  Lady  Baltimore "  is  his  answer.  He  has 
preferred  to  leave  his  old  field  for  an  entirely  new  one.  It  would  be 
hard  to  find  a  story  more  different  from  "  The  Virginian  "  than  "  Lady 
Baltimore  "  is  in  every  respect,  except  its  wholly  indigenous  character. 
Mr.  Wister  has  seen  and  seized  another  piece  of  American  life,  and  has 
given  it  to  us  alive.  Instead  of  the  open  plains,  his  scene  is  a  historic 
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FAIR  MARGARET 

A  PORTRAIT 
By  F.   MARION  CRAWFORD 

Author  of  "  Saracinesca,"  "  Whosoever  Shall  Offend,"  "  In  the  Palace  of  the 
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YOLANDA 

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